We are delighted to announce that two short talks have been selected by votes from participants：

张新民 (Bio, 93′) – COO, BioInfoRx, Inc.
Big Data, Simple Solutions – Cloud-Based Technology Accelerates Genomics Research

刘怡 (Bio, 01′) – Positive Strand Investment Club
Positive Strand: Finding Value for Patients and Investors

Poll Results:

For 14 abstract submissions, we received 37 responses from registered participants. 3 responses didn’t use EventBrite email address, so they are invalid responses. Each response had two votes. There are 68 valid votes.

#13 Positive Strand … has 19 votes
#10 Big-Data … has 12 votes

No other abstract has more than 6 votes.

Selected Abstracts

Big Data, Simple Solutions– Cloud-Based Technology Accelerates Genomics Research

BioInfoRx is a Wisconsin-based software company founded by two PKU Bio alumni. Besides sharing the unique experience in PKU, both founders are experts in solving biological questions with computational approaches. We believe biomedical scientists in the new millennium should be able to make discoveries from big data without having to learn programming, and our goal is to provide innovative web-based solutions that enable and empower scientists. We have contributed to over 50 peer-reviewed publications and completed many large scale genomic projects for academia and pharma companies.

The challenges for genomic data in biomedical research are two folds: 1) data creation technologies have outpaced traditional data management and processing capabilities; and 2) the outputs from most analytical software are hard to interpret and integrate with other results. We have developed unique web-based technologies specifically for life science big data. Our cloud-based data analysis pipeline enables researchers to process large NGS data without worrying about IT infrastructure and software dependencies. Importantly, we provide a unified web-based platform for genomic data management, visualization, functional analysis, and integration. This platform has been successfully applied to a variety of biological big data including genomics, proteomics, metabolics, and flow cytometry data. Published examples include mouse diabetes database and medicago phosphoprotein database.

The focal point of our services and platform is to deliver biological meaningful results from big data. We have demonstrated that cloud-based technologies can apply to various scientific areas and accelerate researches. We are now launching the next generation systems that enable researchers to process NGS data easily, perform data mining quickly, and build interactive web database from their own data sets. We believe this will transform how scientists share and access big data in the future.

Positive Strand: Finding Value for Patients and Investors

Founded in January 2013 by a group of PKU alumni and friends, Positive Strand Investment Club (PSIC) ranks No. 1 in Google for independent equity research on healthcare, biotechnology, and pharmaceuticals.

Unlike in-house analysts on Wall Street who sit far away from research and development, our partners hold senior positions across academia, industry and healthcare-related professional fields. Unlike other amateur investment clubs, our partners not only possess diverse technical expertise, but also are committed to conduct sophisticated research as a group.

We’ve developed an evolving research framework. First, we go through clinical stage companies that have major catalyst events coming (NDA filing; PDUFA pending; or CRL received) to select one for detailed study. Second, we survey the indicated disease for market potential and unmet medical needs. Third, we evaluate the candidate drug for its risk and benefit profile, probability of approval and competitive landscape. Finally, we do financial analysis to make investment decision.

After 37 online meetings, we have accomplished 7 analysis projects, identified innovative companies that focus on satisfying unmet medical needs and improving people’s quality of life. Of 7 small companies we studied, 4 were already acquired by big pharma, proving their value. We learned a lot, including FDA regulatory pathway, drug development success rates, and factors that imply approval probabilities.

With our unique platform and efficient framework, PSIC embraces the financial industry trend that shifts equity research towards independent firms. In the future, we will build on our knowledge and experience, and start an investment fund for healthcare sector. Please visit pstrand.com for more info.