St. Jude Research

St. Jude BioHackathon

The St. Jude KIDS23 (Knowledge in Data Science) BioHackathon will be held from May 3-5, 2023 in association with the St. Jude KIDS23 Data Science Symposium.

Are you a non-St. Jude employee/student Interested in knowing more? Fill out the interest form to be notified when projects are available and sign-ups open. Limited travel awards will be available to US residents, though virtual participation is also welcome.

External Participant Interest Form

Project Proposals

Project proposals are now being accepted from St. Jude members! The listed challenges can be used as prompts for projects, though projects addressing other problems are welcome as well. Project proposals will be open through January 31st. Project proposers will be de facto team leads to serve as a contact point with event organizers.

Project Proposal Form

What is a hackathon?

An event where diverse, multidisciplinary participants gather, collaborate, and build software-based solutions that address real-world needs during a 48-72-hour span. Hackathons foster new relationships among community researchers, encouraging the sharing of knowledge and ideas. Participants are provided the opportunity to flex their creative muscles while building solutions that address existing challenges – often acquiring new skills in the process.

Why participate in a Hackathon?

  1. Spark Collaboration

    Meet and collaborate with St. Jude bioinformaticists, computational biologists, biostatisticians, imaging experts, data scientists, software engineers, and more. St. Jude has well over 200 employees with computational job titles across nearly all departments. The Hackathon is an opportunity to work directly with a diverse team on an exciting project to help solve problems proposed by the research community.

  2. Learn and Expand your Skills

    Hackathons provide an excellent opportunity to learn new skills, technologies, and methods. Learn from your teammates and other teams, be recognized for your skills, and identify local experts for a given method, technology, or framework.

  3. Build Something

    Step out of your comfort zone to work on a passion project, something outside your field entirely, or finally put that experimental method that's been bouncing around your head for months to the test. Hackathons are a rare environment in that failure is an acceptable outcome so long as useful knowledge is gained.