West German Genome Center

• Subject Area: General Genetics and Functional Genome Biology
• Term: since 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 407493903

Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) is a key technology in life sciences and, coupled with cutting-edge bioinformatics (BI), essential for advancing scientific excellence at German universities. To address the aim of centralized NGS services while concomitantly harvesting the existing decentralized NGS and (bio-)informatics expertise at several universities, we propose the inauguration of a West German Genome Center (WGGC), assembling six founding universities under coordination of the University of Cologne (UoC). We will implement the WGGC as an NGS Competence Center (NGS-CC) with strong and specialized NGS production sites at UoC, UBO and HHU, combined with excellent BI/computational expertise from all partners. This approach follows best-practice concepts of internationally successful centers (e.g. the Broad Institute) and networks (e.g. the Harvard Cancer Center) that also encompass affiliated, cooperating members.The WGGC partners will contribute complementary expertise to the NGS-CC. UoC’s Cologne Center for Genomics (CCG) has established itself as a leading university-based high-capacity NGS production site in Germany for a large variety of taxa. UBO has a strong record in high-throughput genomics for complex disease research and has become a leader in single-cell genomics. HHU has strongly focused on long-read sequencing as a future area of utmost importance, further strengthened by experts from RWTH and MPIPZ. USAAR contributes jointly with UDE and UBO to national and international networks in epigenomics research and will bring WGGC to the attention of important international consortia.The WGGC assembles numerous experts covering most aspects of NGS research, with strong capabilities in human and medical genetics, onco- and plant genomics. Expertise includes management of advanced sequencing infrastructure, genomics of diverse taxa, genome and transcriptome assembly, biodiversity research in animals and plants, epigenomics, computational biology, BI, high-performance computing, statistics, and data science. WGGC’s inauguration will form an outstanding platform to advance collaborative research projects. Committing >50% of its newly acquired NGS/BI capacity as service to the German research community, all WGGC partners will serve by consulting, collaboration, and/or data analysis.We thus propose the WGGC as a consortium of esteemed universities in close proximity in Western Germany with excellent NGS competence and long-standing DFG-funded NGS infrastructure. Given this grown NGS landscape, we are convinced that such partnering, where NGS services are concentrated yet NGS development and innovation is allowed to flourish at all partnering WGGC sites, will turn out as the optimal strategy for developing, advancing, and providing this essential technology. The WGGC will bundle capacity and expertise to all scientists with NGS demands in Western Germany and assist them in conducting nationally and internationally competitive research.

• DFG Programme: Major Instrumentation Initiatives
• Major Instrumentation: 3x High Throughput DNA Sequencer ; Laboratory Information Management System (IT) ; Long Read DNA Sequencer ; System for Sample Preparation (Automation for Sample and Library Preparation)
• Instrumentation Group: 1060 Dilutoren, Pipettiergeräte, Probennehmer ; 3150 DNA-Sequenzer ; 7031 Labor-EDV-Systeme
• Applicant Institution: Universität zu Köln
• Leaders: Professor Dr. Michael Nothnagel, Ph.D., since 5/2023; Professor Dr. Peter Nürnberg, until 4/2023