BioExcel Webinar #9 - Defining training requirements for Biomolecular researchers with high computational needs

Life Science research has become increasingly digital and has a direct influence on our daily life in areas such as health and medical applications, drug discovery, agriculture and food industry. It is one of the largest and fastest growing communities in need of high-end computing, leading to an increasing number of life science researchers who are not computing experts but who need to use complicated computationally intensive biomolecular modelling tools. The BioExcel Training Programme is aimed at supporting these academic and industrial researchers in the use of high-performance computing (HPC) and high-throughput computing (HTC). To make sure that the biomedical research communities can fully profit from the training offered through the Centre of Excellence we have determined the training needs for three user groups (Entry Level Users, Specialist Users and System Administrators & Applications Experts) by drafting a competency profile. The competencies have been determined with the aid of the community and sent out for wider consultation. To enrich the competency profile we have, for each competence, defined what an individual will need to know and what skills they need to have to exhibit competence in a specific area, as well as list what behaviours are suited and unsuited to an individual with that particular competency – so that individuals can assess their own competence in each area and select appropriate training. The competencies have been mapped against existing training (online as well as face-to-face courses) to reveal where gaps in training resources are present. The BioExcel Training Programme will focus on developing new training courses and material to fill the gaps in training resources. This webinar will present the completed BioExcel Competency profile, the gap analysis and the plans for the BioExcel Training Programme. In additional we want to make everyone aware and if relevant to you, invite you to join the newly formed BioExcel Training Interest Group