New Directions in Bioinformatics

Two decades have passed since the first large scale, public access computer-based information systems were developed to store and disseminate the knowledge of medicine and biology. These first systems were bibliographic, and though the searching of computer files of citations remains the most common use of biological databases, there are dramatic forces at work in basic biology which are driving a transition from the printed page to the factual database. Unlike bibliographic systems, which contain only a pointer to information located elsewhere, factual data-bases contain the information sought. Development of automated methods to sequence DNA, RNA, proteins, and other macromolecules have yielded oceans of cryptic symbols, for which there is an absolute dependence upon computerized factual databases to acquire, store, retrieve, and analyze data. The Human Genome Project has focussed attention on the information science aspects of nucleic acid data, yet for the practicing scientist nucleic acids and other sequence data are just one piece of an increasingly complex biological puzzle whose solution will be expressed in terms of structure and function. Access to and integration of information across multiple related biological data-bases is a major challenge facing information system builders, a challenge which holds the promise of creating knowledge synergy from what are today disconnected, stand-alone information sources.