Focusing on building the research team Our model of collaboration between Indiana University and Harbin Engineering University Yunlong Liu, Ph.D. Department of Medical and Molecular Genetics Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Indiana University School of Medicine
Outline Who are we? Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics @ Indiana University School of Medicine College of Automation @ Harbin Engineering Univ. Collaboration model Focusing on building the research team Experience and lessons Road blocks
Who are we?
CCBB @ IU Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Established in 2003 Under Indiana University School of Medicine 12 primary faculty from 6 departments 2 full, 5 associate, and 5 assistant professors Genetics, genomics, proteomics, drug design, pharmacometrics, systems biology
Harbin Engineering University School history 1953: People s Liberation Army Military Engineering Institute ( 哈 军 工 ) 1970: Harbin Shipbuilding Engineering Institute ( 哈 尔 滨 船 舶 工 程 学 院 ) 1994: Harbin Engineering University ( 哈 尔 滨 工 程 大 学 )
College of Automation @ HEU 204 faculty 41 doctor advisors, and 127 master advisors 13 divisions Major research directions include control theories, navigation, underwater robots, pattern recognition, 6 PhD programs, 16 master programs, and 4 undergraduate majors Over 400 million Yuan in funding for the past 3 years
Why they need us? Most funds are from contracts from military and other domestic industry Production, not research based Not enough papers with adequate scientific impacts Bioinformatics is categorized as one of the 2 nd level research subjects under control subject Established Bioinformatics Research Center in July 2013
Collaboration Model
Key elements Focus on research team development Establish collaboration with local and domestic medical institutes Clarify the evaluation mechanisms Articulate IP (intellectual properties) and authorship arrangement Select one or two directions for commercialization
Research Team Development A. Keith Dunker Lang Li Yunlong Liu Li Shen Kun Huang Xiaowen Liu US team HEU team Bo He Lei Wang Weixing Feng Hong Liang Xinyan Xiong? Graduate Students
Research Team Development Faculty visit US faculty visit HEU in a regular basis (1-2 weeks) Seminars/direct supervising Short courses HEU faculty visit Indiana (1-2 years) Year 1: Apply for CSC/Provincial support Year 2: Supported by US research funds Regular lab meetings through teleconferencing Discussing project progress, manuscript writing, and funding applications Improves English-writing skills
Collaboration with other Chinese universities Establish efficient data analysis platform, capitalize computational skills, and extend collaboration with other medical schools Current collaboration partners: Harbin Medical University 1 st Affiliated Hospital Harbin Cancer Hospital Harbin Medical University 4 th Affiliated Hospital Shanghai Cancer Institute Goal: Publications: co-authors Research funding: co-pis
Team evaluation and authorship arrangement Evaluation Each team have 1-2 publications per year (Impact Factor >2) Each team is supported by 1-2 national level grant (i.e. Chinese Natural Science Foundation, or 863) Authorship arrangement HEU papers HEU: first author, first corresponding author US faculty: last author, co-corresponding author Collaboration with other institutes Negotiation case-by-case
Experience and lessons
Collaboration needs to be mutually benefit What HEU got? Papers (SCI papers with good impact) Funding more recognized by peers Increased visibility (in Bioinformatics): organizing international conferences A well trained, multi-dimensional research team What the US faculty got? Extended research program, well trained collaborative partners Additional funding source for supporting trainee Free airplane ticket to home and a lot of airline mileage
Experience and lessons IP and authorship need to be explicitly defined Needs to be put on paper (MOU) Trust Strong administrative support Travel funds and student support Funding management mechanism Student quality is the key for the overall success
Road blocks Communication Slow internet Less interactive Technologies tried
Internet2 may be the solution?
Acknowlegement HEU Dean Lin Zhao Indiana Lang Li (CCBB director) Faculty Weixing Feng Kejun Wang Jin Li Bo He Hong Liang Xinyan Xiong Faculty Yunlong Liu Li Shen A. Keith Dunker Bin Xue (USF) Kun Huang (OSU) Xiaowen Liu