Bio Speakers
Emily Clark
Emily Clark recently moved to EMBL’s European Bioinformatics Institute as a Genome Analysis Team Leader where she oversees teams managing data portals for agriculture and biodiversity, and comparative genomics and genome regulation resources in the Ensembl genome browser. Prior to joining EMBL-EBI she was a research group leader at the Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh where her research focused on using genomic tools to understand complex traits in farmed animals. She is co-coordinator of the EuroFAANG Research Infrastructure Project and in her talk will focus on the importance of highly annotation genomes as tools to inform farmed animal production, new requirements for data tools and infrastructure and opportunities for community collaboration in the farmed animal genome and phenome space.
Mike McGrew
Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Dr. Mike McGrew is a professor at the Roslin Institute, part of the Royal Dick School of Veterinary Studies at the University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom. Dr McGrew first earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Minnesota (Saint Paul) followed by a PhD in Biochemistry from Boston University Medical School. He carried out postdoctoral training at the IBDM, Marseille France and at the Roslin Institute, Scotland and was awarded a Chair in Avian Reproductive Technologies at the University of Edinburgh in 2021. The McGrew laboratory at the Roslin Institute studies a special stem cell, the germ cell, which produces the sperm and eggs. These cells can be used to generate genome edited chickens, chicken which contain precise genetic changes in their genome. They use this system to investigate susceptibility to avian influenza infection, sex skewing of chicken, and novel ways to preserve both chicken breeds and avian wildlife.
Ivan Rychlik
Veterinary Research Institute, Brno, Czech Republic
Prof. Ivan Rychlik is a leader of Salmonella research group at the Veterinary Research Institute in Brno, Czech Republic and professor at the Veterinary University, Brno, Czech Republic. His group consists of 10 members and main research interests include characterisation of chicken and pig gut microbiota with special emphasis on the identification of chicken gut microbiota members restricting Salmonella and Campylobacter colonisation and pig microbiota members increasing piglet resistance to Clostridium perfringens. Prof. Rychlik also acts as editor of journals Microbiome and Animal Microbiome. Based on his research, he and his groups introduced a new probiotic product QuoCNA intended for use in newly hatched chicks. The product consists of a defined mixture of 9 different strict gut anaerobes and is commercially available in the Czech Republic since 2024.
Klaus Wimmers
Director, Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN) Professor, Animal Breeding and Farm Animal Husbandry, University of Rostock
Prof. Dr. Klaus Wimmers is an expert in the physiological, genetic, and epigenetic mechanisms underlying trait expression and differentiation, with a particular focus on animal welfare, resilience and resource efficiency. As Director of the Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN) and Professor at the University of Rostock, he leads a research team dedicated to these areas. He is also actively involved in the Functional Annotation of Animal Genomes (FAANG) initiative, contributing to genome annotation projects in pigs and chickens.
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Anna Wolc
Hy-Line International, Dallas Center, IA 50063, USA, Department of Animal Science, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011, USA
Dr. hab. Anna Wolc is an Affiliate Assistant Professor in Animal Breeding and Genetics Group, Department of Animal Science, Iowa State University (Ames, Iowa, USA) and a Genomic Geneticist at Hy-Line Int., which is one of the largest primary breeders for layers in the world. Her research is focused mainly on genomic prediction, identification of genomic regions associated with traits of interest and optimization of breeding programs in poultry. Based on the results she has co-authored over 140 peer-reviewed publications. Dr. Wolc received several awards, including a Scholarship from the Foundation for Polish Science START, American Egg Board Research Award (2018, 2024).
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