Meeting on Joint Genome Institute’s (JGI) Conversion to a User Facility

Summary

A meeting of 30 senior scientists and scientific managers from universities, DOE national laboratories, and other federal agencies was held on July 29, 2003, in Pacifica, California, to review the Joint Genome Institute’s plan for converting its Production Genomics Facility (PGF) to a user facility. The JGI staff presented a comprehensive description of the operation of the PGF as a user facility, including a new organizational structure and a process for user project selection and interaction with the JGI staff. During the meeting, senior management of the Advanced Light Source (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), a National Institute of Health Genotyping Facility, and LBNL’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Division presented their experience as operators of user facilities. Current scientific collaborators (including representatives from industry, the Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency, frog researchers, other major sequencing centers, and microbial scientists), members of the JGI Policy Board, and user facilities operators all reviewed and commented on JGI plans. Suggestions were made to improve some aspects of the process but overall the plan was well received. The PGF is scheduled to complete its transition to a user facility in FY 2004.