Michael Roach

Background

About Michael Roach

Senior Research Fellow in Bioinformatics at the Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute (FHMRI), passionate about research software engineering in High Performance Computing (HPC) environments, with expertise in genomics, metagenomics, drug discovery, and most recently Single Cell and Spatial-Omics technologies. At the Australian Wine Research Institute, I assembled the Chardonnay genome and developed a new standard for grapevine clonal marker discovery that was used to shed light on a 60-year-old mystery Chardonnay clone. I developing the highly cited Purge Haplotigs pipeline for diploid assembly cleanup and engaging in various yeast genomics projects and interactive data visualisations. At the Flinders Accelerator for Microbiome Exploration, I developed a framework for rapid development of bioinformatics tools that simplified both the development cycle and maintenance, as well as improving usability and end-user experience. We have applied this to many bioinformatics projects, and I was awarded the ABSCBS- and ARDC-supported “Torsten Seemann” Outstanding Bioinformatics software Developer Award for 2022. At the Adelaide Centre for Epigenetics (ACE) and the South Australian immunoGENomics Cancer Institute (SAiGENCI) I was leveraging my past genomics and structural modelling experience to drive innovation in the fast-evolving world of Single Cell and Spatial-Omics. Outside work, I'm a beer brewing enthusiast and BCJP-certified beer judge, and I enjoy cycling, hockey, video games, and making music.