About History Location

About BCF-SIB

The Bioinformatics Core Facility (BCF) is a research and service group within the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioformatics. Our core competence and activities reside in the interface between biomedical sciences, statistics and computation, particularly in the application of high-throughput omics technologies, such as RNA/DNA-sequencing and microaarrays, in molecular research and to problems of clinical importance, such as development of cancer biomarkers. The BCF offers consulting, teaching and training, data analysis support / services, and research collaborations for both academic and industrial partners. We are involved in consulting for several industrial partners in the area of statistical aspects of clinical biomarker development.

History

The BCF was initially founded in 2002 as a data analysis support group within the NCCR Molecular Oncology, serving mostly biomedical research groups in Lausanne, Switzerland, mainly at the Institute of Experimental Cancer Research (ISREC) and the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudoise (CHUV). It has since grown to be a group within the SIB with a widened scope of activities as described above.

Location

We are physically located within the UNIL Dorigny campus, at the western outskirt of the city of Lausanne in Switzerland. Our building, Bâtiment Génopode, also hosts the Center of Integrative Genomics and the headquarter of the SIB, and lies adjacent to the complex of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). Other centers of biomedical research in Lausanne, the CHUV and its biochemisty laboratory in Epalinges are a short distance away. At a wider scale, we are within a few hour trip (flight plus train) from most major Western and Central European cities. We are thus strategically located at the center of "concentration of ideas" and the nexus of collaborative networks.