Change in gene summaries for WS294

A gene summary is a brief description of the key functional aspects of a gene and appears in the “Overview” widget of every gene page in WormBase. Recently we changed the rules for inclusion of data such as large scale expression cluster data and protein domain data in gene summaries. When functional data as represented by Gene Ontology (GO) process, function or cellular component annotations are available for a gene, these are used to generate a gene summary. When no GO annotations are available for a gene, then functional data from the orthologous human gene is included in the gene summary. Further, if no tissue or cellular expression is available for the gene, expression cluster and protein domain data are included in the gene summary. Please see the microPublication that describes these updates to the gene summaries for C. elegans and other nematodes in the WS294 release of WormBase.

2023 C. elegans Community Mentor Match Program – MENTEE sign-ups!

The Mentor Match committee is happy to announce Phase 2 of the 2023 C. elegans Community Mentor Match Program – MENTEE sign-ups! 

MENTEES can be postdocs or faculty members at any career stageYou can be both a MENTEE and a MENTOR of more junior researchers if appropriate.

MENTEES, please sign up here by December 31, 2022.

See our fantastic list of 80 available MENTORS to choose from here.

As a MENTEE, you can:

  • Be paired with a specific MENTOR and/or join a PEER MENTORING group
  • Get advice about the next steps in your career
  • Get a broader perspective from outside your specific lab and institution 
  • Benefit from the knowledge and experience of other C. elegans researchers who have navigated similar paths or challenges

For further information about the program, please see this link.

Please forward this email to any C. elegans postdocs or faculty members who you think might be interested in this program.

With best wishes,

– The C. elegans Community Mentor Match committee for 2022-23

Meera Sundaram 
Andrea Calixto Mohor
Heather Bennett
Brent Derry
Jon Hibshman
Massimo Hilliard
Sandhya Koushika
Jeff Medley
Dan Shaye
Sander van den Heuvel

Register for the UK Worm Meeting 2023!

The upcoming UK Worm Meeting is hosted at the University of East Anglia on 13th January 2023. This one-day event will bring together researchers working with C. elegans or researchers working with other nematodes who use shared resources, technologies and expertise. The event will cover a variety of topics including ageing, developmental biology and gene regulation.

The abstract submission deadline is 9th December 2022. Please send your abstracts directly to worm.meeting@uea.ac.uk after completing your registration. When submitting your abstract, please indicate if you want to be considered for a short talk, poster presentation or both.

Registration: https://store.uea.ac.uk/conferences-and-events/faculty-of-science/bio/uk-worm-meeting

-2023 UK Worm Meeting Organizers

2023 C. elegans Community Mentor Match program

Dear Worm Community,

The Mentor Match committee is happy to announce the roll out of the 2023 C. elegans Community Mentor Match Program! 

As a MENTOR, you can:

  • Share your knowledge and expertise to facilitate the professional growth of young C. elegansresearchers; 
  • Establish new connections with talented scientists;
  • Help foster a diverse community of worm scientists around the globe;
  • Gain exposure to broad and diverse perspectives;

For further information about the program, please see this link.

If you are willing to serve as a MENTOR, please sign up here before December 1*.

*Mentors can be postdocs, faculty members, or non-academic scientists with a C. elegansbackground.

*Note that the prospective mentor list will be made public for prospective mentees to browse.

*Please fill out the survey this year even if you have served as a mentor in the past. 

(You do not have to fill it out if you are simply maintaining an existing mentoring relationship, only if you are available for a new mentee).

Please forward this email to anyone who may not be on the WormBase email list! We would particularly like to reach former worm folks who are NOT currently in academia and may be interested in acting as a mentor for worm people considering non-academic career paths.

 A MENTEE survey will be announced via WormBase in December, as soon as the prospective mentors are in place. Stay tuned!

With best wishes,

-The C. elegans Community Mentor Match committee for 2022-23.

Meera Sundaram 
Andrea Calixto Mohor
Heather Bennett
Brent Derry
Jon Hibshman
Massimo Hilliard
Sandhya Koushika
Jeff Medley
Dan Shaye
Sander van den Heuvel

WS286 genome browser

The new genome browser software is a live, in-page genome browser that you can add tracks to, pan, zoom and do a variety of things JBrowse 1 could do without leaving the page. If you’d like a full page JBrowse 2, you can click on the link just above the genome browser, or if you’d like to use JBrowse 1, you can click on the “Legacy” link just below JBrowse 2 to get the old JBrowse 1 image and link back. Please let us know if you have any comments or questions by writing to help@wormbase.org.