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{bio,medical} informatics


Sunday, March 26, 2000

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The New York Times On Road to Human Genome, a Milestone in the Fruit Fly
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"Opening a new window into the mysteries of animal design and the nature of life, biologists described here today how they had decoded almost the entire genetic rule book for making the Drosophila fruit fly, an organism whose study is deeply interwoven with the progress of modern biology. "

"As fly biologists emphasize with the slightest prompting, the fly's genes and proteins have turned out to be surprisingly similar to those of people. Of the 289 genes known to cause human disease in mutated form, 177 have direct counterparts in the fly, Dr. Rubin and his colleagues have concluded after reviewing all the genes in its genome.

This means the genes could be manipulated in the fly as a step toward devising remedies for the human diseases."
Science The Drosophila Genome Sequence: Implications for Biology and Medicine
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"The 120-megabase euchromatic portion of the Drosophila melanogaster genome has been sequenced. Because the genome is compact and many genetic tools are available, and because fly cell biology and development have much in common with mammals, this sequence may be the Rosetta stone for deciphering the human genome.”

Science Genomics: The End of the Beginning
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"The sequencing of the complete genome of the fruit fly Drosophila (Adams et al., Myers et al., Rubin et al.) is a remarkable feat that tells us much about the organization of the genomes of complex creatures. In a Perspective, Brenner looks to the future, to the next big step forward, which will be deciphering what the protein product of each gene does and how each gene is switched on and off. ”

ABC News Gene Mapping Company Says Intentions Misunderstood
"Celera Genomics feels mightily misunderstood these days.

The company, which just announced it has mapped virtually all the genes in the scientifically important fruit fly, first came under fire for its proposals to use a quick-and-dirty method known as "shotgun sequencing" to make a diagram of all the genes in the human body.

Then it was accused of planning to keep all this information to itself, patenting the genes to prevent anyone else from benefiting from the knowledge."

""After we are done with it anyone can have it -- free," Paul Gilman, in charge of policy planning for Celera, said in an interview at the company's headquarters in Rockville.

"Unless you're a database company and you want to repackage it and say 'hey, we've got the genome'."

"Showing off the two rooms of computers that the company uses to piece together information about fragments of DNA and to support its pharmaceutical and biotech subscribers, Gilman said information alone is not a product.

He gave as an example database giant Lexis-Nexis, which sells its online service as a way of searching publicly available information. Its power lies not in the actual newspaper articles and legal documents, which anyone could find with a little bit of effort, but in the shortcuts it provides to finding that information.

"We want to be the next Lexis-Nexis of biology," Gilman said. "We want to become synonymous with modern-day research.""


[ rhetoric ]

Bioinformatics will be at the core of biology in the 21st century. In fields ranging from structural biology to genomics to biomedical imaging, ready access to data and analytical tools are fundamentally changing the way investigators in the life sciences conduct research and approach problems. Complex, computationally intensive biological problems are now being addressed and promise to significantly advance our understanding of biology and medicine. No biological discipline will be unaffected by these technological breakthroughs.

BIOINFORMATICS IN THE 21st CENTURY

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