Meeting report: Functional Genomics and Proteomics - Applications, Molecular Diagnostics & Next Generation Sequencing

The Functional Genomics and Proteomics meeting, which evolved from the Status Seminar Chip Technologies, is an annual event held in early February at the DECHEMA-Haus in Frankfurt, Germany. This year's meeting was held on two particularly cold days (February 2-3, with -10 degrees C / 14 degrees F temperatures). The meeting consisted of two plenary lectures; 17 premier oral presentations - selected from the submitted abstracts based on their "scientific interest level," according to chairman of the scientific organizing committee, Dr. Jorg Hoheisel (German Cancer Research Center - DKFZ, Heidelberg, Germany); 53 poster presentations; and an accompanying exhibition with 19 companies. The meeting also continued its tradition of having a panel discussion at the end of the first day, which was again a highlight of the event - this time on the "facts and fiction" of systems biology.