25 October 2026
ELIXIR Ireland has doubled to ten member institutes. Dublin City University (DCU), Munster Technological University (MTU), South East Technological University (SETU), Trinity College Dublin (TCD) and Technological University Dublin (TU Dublin) have joined the Node. Each now has a representative on the ELIXIR Ireland Management Board, where every member institute holds a vote on the Node's key decisions.
We welcomed our new members at the ELIXIR Ireland onboarding session on 22 October 2026, an introduction to VIBE, ELIXIR Europe and ELIXIR Ireland presented by Aedín Culhane, Head of Node, and Gavin Farrell, Node Coordinator, at the University of Limerick (UL). The full recording is below.
Watch the onboarding session
If the player does not load, watch it on Google Drive. Jump to a section:
- 0:00 Welcome from Aedín Culhane, Head of Node
- 1:28 VIBE and the all-island network
- 5:08 ELIXIR Europe: who we are
- 9:18 The ELIXIR Hub, governance and funding
- 16:08 Platforms, Communities and Focus Groups
- 27:10 BioHackathon Europe and the ELIXIR All Hands
- 29:48 Funding, exchanges and travel grants
- 32:58 ELIXIR services you can use today
- 41:40 ELIXIR Ireland: structure and member institutes
- 43:32 Welcoming our new Management Board members
- 48:46 ELIXIR Ireland plans and sustainable funding
- 52:04 How to get involved, and Q&A
Meet our new Management Board members
Daniel Murphy, DCU
Dr Daniel Murphy is Assistant Professor in Computational Biology in the School of Biotechnology at DCU. His research interests are in genomics, transcriptomics, clinical bioinformatics and precision medicine. He previously worked at the Wellcome Sanger Institute and EMBL-EBI helping to define reference gene sets, including the Ensembl gene annotation system and the MANE transcript set for clinical genomics. He then worked as a clinical bioinformatician at the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, in genomics industry, and as a lecturer in bioinformatics at University College Dublin (UCD).
Daniel is also hosting VIBE 2026 at DCU Glasnevin on 3 December.
Francesca Bottacini, MTU
Dr Francesca Bottacini is a Lecturer in the Department of Biological Sciences at MTU, with a joint affiliation at APC Microbiome Ireland, University College Cork (UCC). Her research applies comparative genomics to beneficial gut bacteria, particularly bifidobacteria: their genome diversity, how they colonise and interact with the infant gut, and their interactions with bacteriophages. Recent work includes genome-scale resources for the infant gut symbiont Bifidobacterium breve (Cell, 2025) and studies of phage defence systems in lactococci (Nucleic Acids Research, 2025).
John Ronan, SETU
John Ronan is Infrastructure Group Manager at the Walton Institute, SETU, where he has been technical lead of the Infrastructure Group since 2016. His work covers research computing infrastructure, OpenStack cloud and networking, with research interests in networks, security and the Internet of Things. John has already worked with ELIXIR Ireland through EOSC Ireland, and brings infrastructure expertise that complements the Node's life science focus.
Máire Ní Leathlobhair, TCD
Dr Máire Ní Leathlobhair is an Assistant Professor in the School of Genetics and Microbiology at TCD. Her research brings genomics and evolutionary biology to cancer, including rare and clonally transmissible cancers. Recent work includes the genomic landscape of adult testicular germ cell tumours in the 100,000 Genomes Project (Nature Communications, 2024) and chromosomal instability in hypodiploid tumours (Genome Medicine, 2026).
Máire hosted VIBE 2025 at TCD and was local host of the ELIXIR Federated Human Data Community meeting in Dublin this October.
Therese Murphy, TU Dublin
Dr Therese Murphy is a Lecturer in the School of Biological, Health and Sports Sciences at TU Dublin. Her research focuses on the epigenomics of complex diseases, particularly depression and inflammatory disorders, combining DNA methylation profiling with machine learning for biomarker discovery. Recent work includes a methylome-wide association study of major depression (Nature Mental Health, 2025) and blood DNA methylation signatures of ageing and disease progression in inflammatory bowel disease (Human Genetics, 2025).
A warm welcome to Daniel, Francesca, John, Máire and Therese, and to colleagues across their institutes. Thank you to everyone who joined the session. If you are at one of our member institutes and would like to get involved, start with our Participate page or email elixir@ul.ie.