SWEET-DB: an attempt to create annotated data collections for carbohydrates.

Area of Science:

• Glycoscience
• Bioinformatics
• Computational Biology

Background:

• Complex carbohydrates play crucial roles in cellular events.
• The structural diversity of carbohydrates implies a high information content within short sequences.
• Efficiently accessing and cross-referencing carbohydrate data is essential for research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop SWEET-DB, a web-based database for annotating and cross-referencing carbohydrate-related data.
• To provide glycoscientists with easy access to comprehensive data for specific carbohydrate structures.
• To integrate information from multiple sources into a structured representation.

Main Methods:

• Utilizing modern web techniques for data annotation and cross-referencing.
• Integrating data from CarbBank (structures, literature), SugaBase (NMR data), and SWEET-II (3D coordinates).
• Providing input spreadsheets for substructures, bibliographic, structural, and biological data.

Main Results:

• SWEET-DB offers a centralized repository for carbohydrate information.
• Users can retrieve reference data from three distinct sources for any carbohydrate substructure.
• The database facilitates access to structural, literature, NMR, and 3D coordinate data.

Conclusions:

• SWEET-DB significantly improves the accessibility of complex carbohydrate data.
• The integrated approach aids glycoscientists in their research by providing structured and comprehensive information.
• Modern web technologies are effective in managing and presenting complex biological data.