ELIXIR
ELIXIR | |
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Mission statement | We enable scientists to access and analyse life science data |
Location |
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Website | www |
ELIXIR (the European life-sciences infrastructure for biological information) is an initiative that allows
Mission
ELIXIR's mission is to build a sustainable European infrastructure for biological information, supporting life science research and its translation to medicine and the environment, the bio-industries and society.[3]
The results from biological experiments produce vast amounts of results that are stored as data using
Organisation and structure
ELIXIR is an inter-governmental organisation which brings together existing
The members of the ELIXIR consortium are European countries, represented by their governments and ministries; the scientific community in each member country develops their national Node, which operates the services and resources that are part of ELIXIR. Each ELIXIR Node is itself a network of national life science organisations, coordinated by a lead institute.
European Molecular Biology Laboratory is an intergovernmental organisation so it is the only Node that is not associated with a country.
ELIXIR focuses efforts around five central areas of activity, referred to as Platforms. These cover Data, Tools, Compute, Interoperability and Training. Work in these areas is intended to improve access to open data resources and tools by improving connectivity, discoverability and access to computational power, as well as developing training for users and service providers to meet these aims.
ELIXIR supports users addressing the Grand Challenges in life science research across diverse domains. ELIXIR supports a range of self-selected Communities, which focus on high-level topics such as ‘Human Data’ and ‘Plant Sciences’ to more specific and focused disciplines such as ‘Metabolomics’ and ‘Intrinsically Disordered Proteins’, as well as a community dedicated to the ‘Galaxy’ resource. These communities are in place to develop bioinformatic and data standards, services and training that are required to facilitate that community to reach their scientific goals.
Participants
As of September 2023 the following countries and
Austria, Cyprus and Romania are Observer countries, working towards ratifying the ECA in the near future.
Countries that have signed the ECA are allocated representation on the ELIXIR Board.
The preparatory phase of ELIXIR was coordinated by Professor Dame
The Founding Director of ELIXIR, Dr Niklas Blomberg, took up his position in the new ELIXIR Hub in Cambridge in May 2013.[5] He left ELIXIR in December 2023 and Prof Tim Hubbard has been appointed the new Director as of March 2024.[6]
Funding
By the end of 2012 ELIXIR completed its five-year preparatory phase funded by the EU's
In 2015 ELIXIR was awarded €19 Million HORIZON 2020 funding to run the EXCELERATE project, this was followed by the CONVERGE project in 2020.[8][9] Both projects enabled ELIXIR to coordinate and extend national and international data resources.[10] ELIXIR has also set up collaborations to apply for other large scale funding for other EU projects, in which it is also involved in an organisational capacity, for example for the CORBEL, FAIRplus, EOSC-Life, B1MG, GDI and BY-COVID projects.
Each member state jointly contributes towards the funding of the ELIXIR Hub in proportion to their GDP. Some countries have allocated new funds to contribute towards their ELIXIR Node. The services and activities of the ELIXIR Nodes will continue to be funded by national agencies. Collectively, ELIXIR members will apply for additional external funding.
In 2024, ELIXIR commences its fourth five-year scientific programme.[11]
References
- ^ PMID 22417641.
- ^ "BioHackathon Europe". biohackathon-europe.org. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
- .
- ^ "ELIXIR Business Case" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 23 April 2013. Retrieved 25 April 2013.
- ^ "ELIXIR appoints Founding Director". ELIXIR. 5 February 2013. Retrieved 16 November 2023.
- ^ "Tim Hubbard to be new ELIXIR Director". ELIXIR. 1 December 2023. Retrieved 8 January 2024.
- ^ Economic and Social Research Council description of FP7. Archived 2011-09-01 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ ELIXIR (11 May 2015). "ELIXIR accelerates with major Horizon 2020 funding". ELIXIR. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ "ELIXIR-EXCELERATE: Fast-track ELIXIR implementation and drive early user exploitation across the life-sciences". CORDIS. European Commission. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ ELIXIR (2 September 2019). "Successful completion of ELIXIR-EXCELERATE marks new stage in ELIXIR's development". ELIXIR. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ "ELIXIR publishes 2024-28 Scientific Programme". ELIXIR. 4 December 2023. Retrieved 8 January 2024.