I spoke at the Bio-IT World Expo last week. It was pretty good. The conference was much larger than last year. As usual, it struggles between being a trade show with vendor talks and an academic forum. Personally, I like the struggle. If it were pure academic, I wouldn’t fit in very well … and if it were pure trade show I wouldn’t go to the sessions. Marketing gives me a near allergic reaction.
Slides are here, if you’re curious, plus a picture of me looking tired. You can’t even see the lump, so maybe it’s just that I *feel* like freakin’ Quasimodo.
As I’ve gushed in person to several folks, the closing keynote by the CEO of 23andme was a particular highlight, since I’ve bought their product. It was interesting to see that their long-range plans include both social and scientific goals.
The closing panel was fascinating to me. It was very much a selection of archetypes:
* Two genomics company CEOs (23andme and Navigenics)
* George Church, the Harvard professor who invented the chemistry behind next-gen DNA sequencing.
* The editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, who has famously been quoted as saying that if you have a spare $1000 to spend on your health, a gym membership would be a smarter buy than a SNP analysis
* Two technophiles, including the CIO of Harvard.
Like the total fanboy I am, I sat in the front row next to cariaso of SNPedia, and giggled when he got a nod from the podium during the keynote.
Other than that, I won’t try to capture the whole conference. It *did* include one overly gluttonous corporate dinner, as well as a few good introductions.
