Annual Retreat held March 14, 2025

The Ray & Stephanie Lane Computational Biology Department held their annual Department-wide retreat on Friday, March 14, 2025.

The retreat began with a state of the department address given by Department Head, Russell Schwartz, which highlighted the department’s work and impact in the Computational Biology Community.

During the retreat, members of the department were invited to give 10 minute “lightning” talks to provide an overview of the diverse research projects that their labs are working on. A poster session also took place where students were given the opportunity to present their research and interact with other members of the department.  

These sessions showcased some of the tremendous breadth of research in the department, including new advances on longstanding department research areas such as automated and AI-driven science, single-cell and spatial genomics, and applications to human health such as for cancer and neurodegenerative diseases.  They also offered a chance for recently hired faculty to introduce the department to novel areas, including new department directions in synthetic biology and an expanded focus on work at the intersection of computational and experimental biology.

The day concluded with an open forum Town Hall meeting led again by Russell Schwartz. Members of the department were able to have their questions addressed directly during this time, leading to a vibrant discussion spanning such issues as future department research directions, program curricula, and new challenges in the federal funding landscape.