Greece is the latest country to join the ELIXIR Infrastructure. The signature of the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement by Professor Kostas Fotakis, Alternate Minister of Research and Innovation, has been announced today during the European Conference for Computational Biology (ECCB) hosted in Athens.
Greece has been involved in ELIXIR from its inception and has already built a national ELIXIR Node linking together 16 institutions in the country. As an ELIXIR Member, the Greek bioinformatics community will be able to fully integrate into ELIXIR activities and collaborate with other ELIXIR Nodes more extensively.
Prof. Kostas Fotakis said: “I am very pleased to be able to sign the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement on behalf of the Greek government. A robust infrastructure for life-science data across Europe is essential to realise the potential of data-driven biology. We are looking forward to sharing our expertise and resources with ELIXIR partners and deepening our collaboration at the European research community.”
ELIXIR Greece Node is led by the Biomedical Sciences Research Center "Alexander Fleming", and offers collection of tools and databases focusing mainly on biomedical research and marine biology. The Node is highlighted on the National Roadmap for Research Infrastructures and has also secured funding from EU Structural and Investment Funds.
Prof. Babis Savakis, Head of ELIXIR Greece said: "We are delighted to be able to announce our full membership in ELIXIR, here in Athens at the ECCB conference. Greece has been already actively participating in many activities. Joining ELIXIR as a full Member will lead to deeper collaboration with ELIXIR partners across Europe and better integration of our resources into ELIXIR.”
ELIXIR now counts 22 members and one Observer (Cyprus), making it the largest ESFRI Research Infrastructure in terms of membership.
More information: www.elixir-greece.org