Transforming global genomics infrastructure through hands-on training and sustainable communities

This photo essay explores some key training initiatives deployed during 2023 and 2024 that illustrate our commitment to global genomics capacity building.

As a Wellcome-funded programme and part of Wellcome Sanger Institute, Connecting Science has a global reputation for delivering excellence in genomics training. Our capacity strengthening efforts are focused within Africa, Asia and Latin America – regions that face complex, intersecting challenges preventing the scale-up of genetics-led research, and the implementation of genomic medicine. These challenges range from economic pressure, limited access to infrastructure to insufficient workforce capacity and expertise.

Over the last 18-months, we have developed programmes focused on two globally significant areas: scaling up the application of genomics for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) surveillance across Africa and Asia; and strengthening existing scientific talent in Latin America to accelerate the use of single cell genomics, to benefit the health of diverse populations.  

Our team collaborates with regional institutions and scientific communities to address these challenges through education and training initiatives tailored to local needs. We build a strong foundation by equipping scientists with essential skills, including how to train others; extending our impact beyond individual courses by fostering sustainable, collaborative frameworks.

AMR In Bacterial Pathogens course participants load a MinION sequencer in our partner training facility at the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD), South Africa (March 2024).

Improving global genomics-based surveillance of AMR, is central to our mission, and our AMR in Bacterial Pathogens course which ran at Mahidol University and Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit (MORU) in Bangkok, Thailand in 2023 and South Africa in 2024, has provided participants with the confidence, skills and knowledge to identify AMR genes, investigate outbreaks, and track transmission of bacterial strains using whole genome sequence (WGS) analysis techniques. 

AMR In Bacterial Pathogens course participants collaborating on a practical project in our partner training facility at Mahidol University, Bangkok (February 2023).

Course participants from across Africa learning how to interpret genomics data, during a computational session held at our partner training facility at the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD), South Africa (March 2024).

Fostering new relationships and collaborations during our courses is an integral part of how we develop effective mechanisms for continued learning across low-resourced scientific communities around the world, ensuring tangible impacts long after our training has been completed. 

One of our sustainable development strategies is to provide environments that enable communities of practice to form across regions with common challenges and goals. We aim to build on our expert-led training, by providing opportunities for open and supportive collaboration that encourages peer-to-peer learning. 

In collaboration with the NICD, South Africa, we brought together over 100 scientists from 28 African countries (50 of whom had attended our AMR training course the week before), at the very first symposium focused on implementing Genomics for Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance and One Health. 

Delegates at the Symposium discussing the challenges of AMR in working groups. Some members had attended the training course the previous week, and were able to share new knowledge and technical skills.

United in their commitment to tackle AMR through the deployment of genomics-led solutions – and some members newly empowered by their recent training with us – they had the opportunity to discuss approaches for applying genomics to real-world surveillance scenarios across Africa, and in the context of local public health decision making. Building on the momentum of the course, members of the group were able to share with others what they had learnt, and begin the process of transferring skills and understanding to the broader scientific community. 

Tung Son Trinh, Oxford University Clinical Research Unit (Hanoi group), and part of our training team for the Integrated Antimicrobial Resistance course, teaching clinical scientists from hospitals based in both Africa and Asia, genomics approaches to apply to their own work. The teaching facility is at the KEMRI-Wellcome institute, Kelifi, Kenya (September 2024). 

In Kilifi, Kenya, we joined our regional partners Wellcome-KEMRI, at their host institution, to deliver an innovative new training intervention developed specifically to support the Wellcome-funded ‘Clinically Oriented Antimicrobial Resistance Network’ (ACORN) project.

The ACORN project, led by the Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit (MORU) and the Oxford University of Oxford Clinical Research Unit (OUCRU), is a pioneering initiative driving the implementation of AMR surveillance in a clinical healthcare context, in nine countries across Asia and Africa; actively developing a model for outbreak management in clinical settings.

To enable the successful integration of genomics into this project we developed an Integrated AMR: from Genomic Analysis to Clinical Application course, with a focus on developing a framework for teaching both clinicians and scientists how to use, and interpret data from, the new genomics tools and technologies being installed as part of the ACORN project.

Through a blend of practical laboratory sessions using next-generation sequencing technologies, as well as hands-on bioinformatics sessions teaching downstream data analysis, we built on the existing knowledge and genomic infrastructure developed by ACORN partners and regional hospital networks.

Our multidisciplinary, expert instructors guided participants through an end-to-end genomics pathway, and used real-world examples to frame the context of the genomic analysis exercises. 

This approach fostered the development of individual skills, and instilled a level of confidence to take on the training and development of members of their clinical institutions.

Valuable sponsor representation from Illumina, Oxford Nanopore, and F&S Scientific, meant participants were able to have an open dialogue with the creators of the technologies they were learning to use and apply. This also gave the sponsors opportunities to have detailed and productive discussions around infrastructure challenges and other shared frustrations – an incredible lead nurturing activity. 

Our AMR work across Africa and Asia illustrates how we are supporting the development of a new paradigm in south-south collaboration, to build sustainable genomics capacity; one that ultimately addresses the common needs and challenges faced by scientists across those regions. 

In July 2023, we held a Single Cell Genomics course, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in collaboration with the Instituto Nacional de Câncer (INCA), Patricia Possik, an investigator at INCA, Mariana Boroni, an associate researcher at INCA, and colleagues from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, focusing on the application of single cell technologies to address the needs of Latin American communities.

Luisa Berná and Caroline Poubel, working alongside peers on the Single Cell Genomics course, in our host training laboratory at the Instituto Nacional de Câncer (INCA), Brazil. 

In June 2024, we were delighted to welcome the champions of our 2023 grant writing competition, held as a workshop at the end of the training programme in Brazil, to our established Single Cell Biology conference in the UK. This opportunity provided these talented scientists with a global platform to present their own research, shaped by their newly acquired single cell genomics skills.  

With their travel sponsored by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), the five winners attended the conference at our flagship home at the Hinxton Hall Conference Centre, on the Wellcome Genome Campus, UK. 

Our grant writing champions and bursary winners celebrating their success with a photo outside of Hinxton Hall (June 2024). 

At the conference, these participants had the opportunity to present their research during a poster pitch session, as part of the main conference programme, as well as discuss their ideas during the various networking sessions, with peers and leaders working in single cell biology.

Alexis Murillo Carrasco presented his research as a short talk, on the stage in the Hinxton Hall Conference Centre Auditorium. 

Caroline Poubel presented a poster on ‘Mapping epigenetic changes on cell type-specific gene enhancers in paediatric Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia with KMT2A rearrangements’ at the 2024 Single Cell Biology conference. 

In August 2024, we returned to INCA, Brazil to deliver a second training course in Single cell Genomics, followed by a brand new symposium, specifically designed to connect scientific communities and advance research across Latin America.  

Participants at our partner training facility, INCA, Brazil, learning how to apply hands-on single-cell techniques to their research. 

The Symposium, organised by INCA in collaboration with Connecting Science and sponsored by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), Pensabio, Fundação do Câncer, Interprise, New England BioLabs, and 10x Genomics, brought together 100 participants, including members of the scientific committee, speakers, students and faculty from the both the 2023 and 2024 iterations of the Single-cell Genomics course. We united Latin American researchers for further learning and collaboration, focusing on the latest approaches in single-cell genomics, across various diseases and health contexts, while addressing specific regional challenges and opportunities. 

Attendees represented various Latin American countries, including Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, Venezuela, Mexico, Panama, and Costa Rica, along with participants from the UK and Canada. 

Crucially, this interactive Symposium supported capacity building and infrastructure development to initiate new, and facilitate existing, projects in the field of single-cell genomics.

Posters and networking at the 2024 Single Cell Symposium. 

Our regionally-focussed approach, combining practical and theoretical tactics, harnesses local scientific expertise to create sustainable training solutions. We develop scientists into capable educators who can pass forward knowledge to upskill peers, accelerate research, and strengthen the local genomic science infrastructure. 

Wellcome Connecting Science continues to create training experiences with enduring impact. By equipping scientists with the expertise and confidence to drive genomics forward, we are not only addressing critical challenges in genomics access and capacity to tackle biological and health questions, but also building resilient, self-sustaining communities capable of advancing global health equity. This collaborative spirit is transforming the future of genomics and paving the way for inclusive and sustainable scientific progress.

– Alice Matimba, Head of Training and Capacity Building, Wellcome Connecting Science