Global Engagement Manager for EMBL-EBI Data Services, EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), UK
Youtube Interview link: Interview with Dr. ThankGod Echezona Ebenezer
Dr. ThankGod Echezona Ebenezer is the Global Engagement Manager for EMBL-EBI Data Services at the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), UK, where his role focuses on exploring new approaches, data, metadata, functions, services, and potential uses of open data in low-resource settings. Prior to taking up this role, ThankGod was a Bioinformatician at Qbio.AI and University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine where his role focused on addressing drug discovery challenges using AI and developing computational pipelines for early cancer detection using circulating tumour DNA methylation markers and machine learning techniques respectively.
Prior to joining Qbio.AI and Cambridge, Dr Ebenezer was previously a Bioinformatician at EMBL-EBI, within the UniProt team, where he developed computational pipelines for automatic functional annotation of proteins using evolutionary models and software engineering best practices. Dr Ebenezer studied for his PhD degree in Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge, UK, where he worked on the genome of Euglena gracilis. He has a MSc in Environmental Toxicology and Pollution Management from the University of Lagos, Nigeria, and a BSc in Parasitology and Entomology from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Nigeria.
Dr Ebenezer is involved in fostering dynamic international and regional collaborations in science. Dr Ebenezer founded the African BioGenome Project (AfricaBP) in 2021. Since 2023 AfricaBP has trained over 800 African researchers in genomics, bioinformatics, sampling, ethics, legal, and social implications of genomics, and has also locally sequenced the genomes of several endemic African plant and animal species.