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CUNY SPH Assistant Professor Sehyun Oh has led the development of two innovative software packages that promise to make advanced genomic analysis more accessible to researchers worldwide.
The tools, published in F1000Research and Bioinformatics, provide new solutions for analyzing complex biological data in the cloud and improving biomarker detection in metagenomic studies.
The first tool, AnVILWorkflow, allows researchers to easily execute complex genomic analyses using cloud computing resources without requiring extensive technical expertise.
“Many researchers have the scientific knowledge to interpret genomic data but lack the computational infrastructure to process it,” explains Dr. Oh. “AnVILWorkflow bridges this gap by providing a user-friendly way to access powerful cloud-based analysis tools.”
In a separate publication, Dr. Oh’s team introduced the lefser, an improved implementation of a widely-used microbiome biomarker discovery tool. This new version enhances the statistical accuracy and reproducibility of the original method while making it more accessible to researchers who use the R programming language.
“These tools represent important steps toward democratizing genomic research,” says Dr. Oh. “By making advanced analysis methods more accessible and reliable, we’re helping researchers focus on scientific discovery rather than technical challenges.”
Both software packages are freely available through the Bioconductor project and are already used by researchers studying various health conditions, including cancer and microbiome-related diseases.
Dr. Oh’s work was supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute and the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health, demonstrating the national recognition of this research’s importance.
