VIBE 2025 - 25th Anniversary
Conference Monday 8th December, ECR Panels Tuesday 9th December 2025
Trinity College Dublin
Our sponsors
Keynote Speakers
Dr. María Ávila-Arcos
Group Leader, International Laboratory for Human Genome Research, National Autonomous University of Mexico
María Ávila-Arcos is an Associate Professor at the International Laboratory for Human Genome Research (LIIGH) at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). She completed her undergraduate studies in Genomic Sciences at UNAM and earned her doctorate in Palaeogenomics from the University of Copenhagen. She subsequently held a postdoctoral fellowship in Population Genetics at Stanford University. Dr. Ávila-Arcos's research leverages ancient and modern DNA to investigate the evolutionary history of Mexican populations and the pathogens that have infected them. A central focus of her pioneering work involves characterizing the African genetic component of the Afro-Mexican population. Her research has been instrumental in reconstructing the demographic and adaptive processes that shaped Mexico's genetic diversity. Furthermore, her ancient pathogen work has traced the introduction routes of pathogenic bacteria and viruses into Mexico during the European colonization era. Currently, Dr. Ávila-Arcos is on a sabbatical (until August 2026) at The Smurfit Institute of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin, working with Professor Dan Bradley.
Dr. Nikolaos Vakirlis
G4 Group Leader, Evolutionary Genomics Group, Hellenic Pasteur Institute
Nikolaos Vakirlis is a computational biologist specialized in evolutionary genomics. He has a PhD from Sorbonne University in Paris, France and has worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Ireland, Germany and Greece. His main goal throughout his career has been to understand how and why novel genes originate during evolution and his research has helped elucidate the mechanism of de novo gene birth. Since October 2024, Dr. Vakirlis has been a G4 group leader at the Hellenic Pasteur Institute, at the head of a multidisciplinary team. His group continues to investigate the processes generating genetic novelty across different lineages but they also focus on antimicrobial peptides, an important component of the natural defense of all organisms against pathogens. By detecting them and studying their evolutionary dynamics at the scale of all animals, Dr. Vakirlis's group aim to ultimately be able to harness them as alternative antibiotics. His group also studies the origins and evolution of novel ‘microproteins’ in bacteria to understand how they may acquire functions related to antibiotic resistance and antimicrobial activity.
Venue
VIBE 2025 will take place at Trinity College Dublin, in the Smurfit Institute of Genetics and Hamilton Building. Exact room locations will be included on the timetable. The evening social event will take place in the Pavillion Bar. These locations are circled on the map below. The closest gates to these locations are Lincoln Place gate and the Science Gallery gate. Front Gate and Nassau Street gate are a 5-10 minute walk from these buildings. These entrances are marked with stars on the map. A Google map with pinned locations is available here.
College maps and directions to campus are available here. The TCD Sense map, which provides information about the sensory environments of locations across Trinity, and information on physical access, is available here.
A private room will be available in the Smurfit Institute of Genetics for those who need it, for example for breastfeeding or prayer.
Conference Program (8th December)
9:00-10:00 • Smurfit institute of genetics - Atrium
Sign in and coffee/pastries
10:00-10:15 • Hamilton building - MacNeill theatre
Welcome and opening remarks
10:15-11:00 • Hamilton building - MacNeill theatre
Keynote 1: Dr Nikolaos Vakirlis - Chair Amy Ó Brolcháin
Session 1: Evolution and population genetics - Chair Dr Elle Loughran
From Similarity to Specificity: Dissecting Functional and Mutational Landscapes of Paralogous Genes
Olivier Dennler | 11:00-11:12
Gene gain, sequence evolution, and synteny shape the diversification of Lepidoptera
Peter Mulhair | 11:12-11:24
Genomic testing of hypotheses on the origins of the Grecìa Salentina population and language
Martina Gulì | 11:24-11:36
Genomic characterisation of recurrent Mycobacterium avium isolates from chronically infected patients reveals patterns of within-host evolution
Aaron Walsh | 11:36-11:42
What's in a Name? Tracing the Structural and Functional Evolution of the Ligand of Numb Protein X Family
Leah Gabrielle Erwin | 11:42-11:48
Evolution of histone mRNA 3' end processing machinery in eukaryotes
Bin Zhao | 11:48-11:54
CloudCIX talk
11:54-12:00
12:00-12:10
Break
Session 2: Medical genetics - Chair Corey Alwell
The presence of a secondary species alters P. aeruginosa ciprofloxacinresistance evolution in the cystic fibrosis lung
Sadhbh Dodd | 12:10-12:22
Blood DNA Methylation Modifications in Response to Opioid Exposure in a Rodent Model
Nicole Glendinning | 12:22-12:34
Development of a blood-based transcriptional biosignature for the detection of cattle infected with Mycobacterium bovis, which causes bovine tuberculosis
David MacHugh | 12:34-12:46
Single-Cell Transcriptomic Decoding of B Cell Diversity in IgA Vasculitis Reveals a Glycosylation-Dysregulated Naïve Subset.
Joao Carlos Batista-Liz | 12:46-12:52
Quantifying Haploinsufficiency in Tumour Suppressor Genes: a Cancer Hallmarks-Based Functional Screen
Elle Loughran | 12:52-12:58
Transcriptomic Dysregulation of Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stromal Cells in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus
Jingyan Wang | 12:58-13:04
Concurrent session: Posters
13:05-14:30 • Smurfit institute of genetics - Atrium: Evolution and population genetics
Posters and coffee/lunch
13:05-14:30 • Moyne institute: Medical genomics & Methods and tools
Posters and coffee/lunch
Concurrent session: ELIXIR
13:30-14:30 • Smurfit institute of genetics - Dawson room
VIBE & ELIXIR-IE breakout session
14:35-15:20 • Hamilton building - MacNeill theatre
Keynote 2: Dr. María Ávila-Arcos - Chair Catherine Butt
Session 3: Evolution and population genetics - Chair Tomas Gomes
Characterisation of diverse global ancestries among participants of the UK Biobank illustrates the immigration history of Great Britain in the 20th century
Fiona Pantring | 15:20-15:32
Homology-Based miRNA Annotation and Evolution Across Mammals
Sarahjane Power | 15:32-15:44
Building a Placenta: Roles for Syncytin-Like Retroviral Envelopes of Livebearing Fish
Amy Ó Brolcháin | 15:44-16:56
Natural knock-outs of human genes are more frequently observed in genes with paralogs.
Carlos Vivas Rodríguez | 15:56-16:02
A Duplicate-Resolved Paddlefish Genome Provides Insights into the Mechanisms of Rediploidization and Hox Cluster Evolution
Dearbhaile Casey | 16:02-16:08
The Genomics of an Irish Hunter-Gatherer Community
Corey Alwell | 16:08-16:14
Developing research infrastructure to empower Irish genetics and genomics innovation under EHDS
Aedín Culhane | 16:14-16:20
16:20-16:30
Break
Session 4: Methods and Tools - Chair Róisín Long
Development of a Nextflow Pipeline for Consensus MHC Class I Genotyping within a Cloud-Based Neoantigen Prediction Workflow
Kevin Ryan | 16:30-16:42
AMRcast: A machine learning framework to predict AMR phenotypes from genomic functional annotations
Lucy Dillon | 16:42-17:54
PyamilySeq: Transparent and interpretable gene (re)clustering and pangenomic inference highlights the fragility of conventional methods
Nicholas Dimonaco | 16:54-17:06
CarbaSnake: a clinically orientated, open-source workflow for the genomic characterisation of Carbapenemase-producing Enterobacterales (CPE)
Emily Cronin | 17:06-17:12
A predicted cancer dependency map for paralog pairs
Narod Kebabci | 17:12-17:18
Predicting drug resistance to synthetic lethal therapies in cancer
Metin Yazar | 17:18-17:24
Evaluation of partitioning algorithms for trustworthy out-of-distribution evaluation of machine learning models in biochemistry
Raúl Fernández Díaz | 17:24-17:30
17:30-17:40 • Hamilton building - MacNeill theatre
Closing remarks and awards - Chair Dr Máire Ní Leathlobhair
18:00 • The Pav
Social event with Roots in Tune
ECR Meeting Program (9th December)
10:30-11:00 • Smurfit institute of genetics - Atrium
Sign in and coffee/pastries
Careers in academia panel - Chair Dr Elle Loughran
Opening talk
Dr Karen Siu Ting | 20-25 minutes
Queen's University Belfast
Assistant Professor, UCD
Assistant Professor, UCD
Gerda Henkel Fellow, TCD
12:30-14:00 • Smurfit institute of genetics - Atrium
Lunch and industry mixer
Beyond academia panel - Chair Catherine Butt
Opening talk
Dr Colm Ó Dushlaine | 20-25 minutes
Head of Statistical Genetics, insitro
Bioinformatician, St James's Hospital, Dublin
Bioinformatician, National Virus Reference Laboratory
Expert Scientific Writer, Novartis
15:30-15:40 • TCIN - LB11
Closing remarks