Ana Conesa is internationally known for her contributions in the field of computational biology and bioinformatics. Recognized as an ISCB fellow since 2023, the researcher has been deeply honored by this appointment and has celebrated that "we are living through an exciting time for our field and a challenging time for science". "I hope to contribute to keeping ISCB a driving force for scientific discovery and collaboration in computational biology around the world," she added.
Both Conesa and Bonnie Berger, who was elected ISCB president in the same process, will officially take office in January 2026 after a period of training.
According to Conesa, the ICCS faces two important challenges in its near future: the defense of the scientific method and the guidance of a responsible and sustainable AI in science.
"First, we are witnessing a worrying decline in confidence in science. The growing tendency to question data and scientific rigor in favour of personal or political interests threatens not only our ability to generate new knowledge, but also the very definition of truth and evidence-based decision making", says the researcher, who adds that "in this context, defending the scientific method and its values becomes essential".
Secondly, Conesa notes that "the rapid integration of artificial intelligence into science presents both an enormous opportunity and a series of pressing responsibilities".
"We are witnessing a worrying decline in confidence in science. The growing tendency to question data and scientific rigor in favor of personal or political interests threatens not only our ability to generate new knowledge, but also the very definition of truth and evidence-based decision making", Ana Conesa, I2SysBio researcher
"In computational biology, AI is already transforming the way we analyze and interpret complex data, accelerating discoveries at an unprecedented rate. However, this transformation also depends on the continued availability of open and shared data sets, which must remain a cornerstone of our field. At the same time, AI poses new challenges such as algorithmic bias, transparency and significant environmental costs," she explains.
In this sense, Conesa assured that the ISCB "must lead the promotion of a responsible and sustainable AI through the development of tools, standards and good practices driven by the community".
Ana Conesa is a research professor at the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC) and an associate professor at the University of Florida (EE. UU.). She is a member of the Royal Academy of Engineering of Spain, an honorary member of the Spanish Society of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, and a member of the Board of the International Society of Computational Biology.
Her laboratory at the Institute of Integrative Systems Biology (I2SysBio), located in the scientific-academic area of the University of Valencia Science Park (PCUV), ConesaLab (Conesalab), develops bioinformatics methods and tools to analyze various aspects of transcriptome biology, including RNA processing, dynamic changes, regulation, interactions and function. Since ConesaLab have created more than twenty software tools used by tens of thousands of researchers around the world. It has also pioneered the development of computational methods for applying single-molecule sequencing technologies to transcriptome analysis.
Conesa has led numerous international projects and research consortia in computational biology, coordinating more than thirty international teams and securing funding from the European Commission, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation and NASA, among others. She advises funding agencies and research institutes around the world and has designed and delivered bioinformatics courses on five continents, training over 1,000 researchers. She is also the founder and former scientific director of Biobam Bioinformatics, a company that develops user-friendly software for genomic research.
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Source: I2SysBio