Case Study: Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute achieves scalable, easy-to-administer global bioinformatics training with Ubuntu

Ubuntu enables advanced computer research into killer diseases

The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, a charity leading genomic research into killer diseases like malaria, typhoid and MRSA, runs free bioinformatics workshops for researchers in developing countries and donated high‑power computers to the Instituto de Higiene in Uruguay. Their Informatics Systems Group needed a reliable, easy-to-deploy training-room solution that could be installed anywhere with electricity and an Internet connection and administered by local staff.

They integrated Ubuntu into a self-contained training room with network‑based automatic workstation installs, out‑of‑the‑box hardware and language support, and automated updates to reduce local admin overhead. The setup uses a Smoothwall gateway, two training servers (Ubuntu and Windows) and dual‑boot workstations; after the Uruguay pilot Ubuntu was installed there and in Kilifi, Kenya, with further sites in Vietnam, Thailand and Malawi planned.

Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute

Andrew Flint

Senior Systems Engineer