Bioinformatics training needs of Australian researchers: 2021/22 survey

Bioinformatics has become a core part of life science research. Life scientists must continually gain and refresh their bioinformatics skills in order to take advantage of new technologies, move between research topics and progress their careers. 

To ensure training remains relevant, life science trainers must keep pace with the rapidly developing field and evolve their training offerings to respond to demand and changes in scientific thinking.

In 2016 EMBL-ABR (a precursor of Australian BioCommons) surveyed life scientists and medical researchers to gauge bioinformatics and computational biology needs in Australia. More than 90% of respondents considered training to be important, with demand for immediate training on all suggested topics: basic computing (Linux) and scripting (Python,R); data management and metadata; integrating multiple data types; and scaling analysis to cloud 1. Similar results were obtained from surveys in European and US settings 2.

Much has changed in the world of bioinformatics since 2016. New technologies and methodologies have been developed (e.g. scRNAseq) and certain tools and platforms have become more accessible and popular among life scientists (e.g Galaxy, RStudio). The pandemic has also changed the way that we work and collaborate. Given these changes, a re-evaluation of training needs and preferred modes of learning was necessary.

Here we report the results of the 2021/22 Australian Bioinformatics Training Needs Survey. The questions included in the survey and anonymised responses are included as supplementary files.

This survey was developed, run and analysed by the National Bioinformatics Training Cooperative, convened by Australian BioCommons.