Bielefeld-Gießen Resource Center for Microbial Bioinformatics (BiGi)
The staff of the Service Center "Bielefeld-Gießen Resource Center for Microbial Bioinformatics" (BiGi)de.NBI Services offered by BiGi de.NBI Training offered by BiGi
About
The Bielefeld-Gießen (BiGi) Bioinformatics Resource Center combines bioinformatics expertise providing bioinformatics support, compute resources, and software tools and pipelines for the field of microbial genome research. The BiGi service center brings together four partners: Alexander Goesmann (Liebig University Gießen (JLU)), Jens Stoye (Bielefeld Institute for Bioinformatics Infrastructure (BIBI), Bielefeld University), Alexander Sczyrba (Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ), IBG-5 and Bielefeld University), and Robert Heyer (Leibniz-Institut für Analytische Wissenschaften (ISAS) and Bielefeld University).
Services
The BiGi service center provides a complementary suite of services, tools, and training to support microbial research across all levels of user expertise. Tailored support is offered to both biologists and bioinformaticians, ranging from ready-to-use software solutions and guided data analysis for beginners, to direct access to high-performance and cloud computing infrastructures for advanced users developing novel computational approaches. The center places strong emphasis on first-level user support as well as the customization and ongoing development of services meeting the diverse needs of its users’ research.
The service portfolio spans a wide range of bioinformatics disciplines, enabling comprehensive microbial data analysis from raw sequencing data to complex multi-omics integration. Core activities are driven by the expertise of several specialized research groups: the group led by Alexander Goesmann develops scalable software tools and databases for the automated processing of whole-genome sequencing data, including detailed isolate characterizations and comparative genomics; Jens Stoye’s group focuses on the development of novel algorithms and software tools for pangenomic analysis; Alexander Sczyrba’s team provides advanced solutions for metagenomic data analyses; and Robert Heyer’s group offers tools for the analysis and interpretation of complex, multidimensional omics datasets.
Developments
The BiGi service center actively drives the development of novel innovative tools and infrastructures to advance microbial bioinformatics. For example, among these is CloWM, a cloud-based workflow manager that simplifies the use of Nextflow workflows, enabling scalable and reproducible data analysis in distributed computing environments. Metagenomics-tk offers an automated, high-throughput workflow for metagenomic data analysis, supporting a wide range of research applications with minimal manual intervention. MetaProteomeAnalyzer Cloud (MPA Cloud) is a software for metaproteomics analysis with heavy focus on latest algorithms and scalability through cloud computing.
The Aruna Data Management System delivers a fast, secure, and domain-independent framework for managing large-scale research data across its entire lifecycle. BakRep provides a curated and metadata-rich bacterial genome repository, facilitating large-scale comparative genomics and efficient data mining. These and further efforts exemplify BiGi’s commitment to providing the microbial research community with user-friendly, scalable, and cutting-edge bioinformatics solutions.
Project Management
Bioinformatics and Systems Biology
Prof. Dr. Alexander Goesmann (Service Center Coordinator)
Bioinformatik und Systembiologie
Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen
Heinrich-Buff-Ring 58
35392 Gießen
Bielefeld Institute for Bioinformatics Infrastructure (BiBI) Website
Prof. Dr. Jens Stoye
Technische Fakultät
Universität Bielefeld
Universitätsstraße 25
33615 Bielefeld
Mehrdimensionale Omics-Datenanalyse
Prof. Dr. Robert Heyer
Technische Fakultät
Universität Bielefeld
Universitätsstraße 25
33615 Bielefeld
Computergestützte Metagenomik (IBG-5)
Prof. Dr. Alexander Sczyrba
Forschungszentrum Jülich
c/o Centrum für Biotechnologie
Universität Bielefeld
Universitätsstraße 27
33594 Bielefeld
Posters
