NRSP-8 Bioinformatics

The Missions

Bioinformatics is the application of computer technology to the management and dissemination of biological information, especially genome information. Bioinformatics is becomiong an essential infrastructure supporting genomics research. As such, the diverse needs of the current animal genomics research presents a huge challenge to bioinformatics tools development. The recent summary and recommendations from the USDA Stakeholder Workshop on Animal Bioinformatics (2003) provided a practical outline of such needs. In brief, the challenges in bioinformatics support/research for animal genomics may involve

Effective data collection, organization and management
Rapid development of most needed bioinformatics tools and resources
Efficient use of these tools for innovative data analysis

We at NRSP-8 bioinformatics coordination program strive to serve the animal genomics research community to better use computer tools and methods, to best utilize available resources, and in working with researchers in the community, to effectively share, combine, manage, manipulate, and analyze information from genomics/genetics studies.

(December 2003, Zhiliang Hu)