Bioinformatics is the application of computer technology to the management of biological data. It encompasses a wide range of activities from the development and analysis of algorithms to the design and implementation of databases and software tools. The ultimate goal of bioinformatics is to enable biologists to gain a better understanding of living systems at all levels, from individual molecules to whole organisms.
The term “bioinformatics” was first coined in 1968 by Paulien Hogeweg, a Dutch theoretical biologist (Hogeweg, 1968). However, it was not until the late 1980s that bioinformatics began to emerge as a distinct discipline, with the advent of powerful computers and sophisticated statistical methods. Since then, there has been an explosion in both the volume and variety of biological data available for analysis.
Today, bioinformatics is an essential tool for research in all areas of biology, from molecular evolution to population genetics (cf. Durbin et al., 1998; Chen et al., 2002). It also plays an increasingly important role in clinical medicine, with applications ranging from DNA sequencing for diagnosis and prognosis of genetic diseases to drug discovery and development (cf. Altman & Krzywinski, 2004; Goto et al., 2005).
With its origins in mathematics and computer science, bioinformatics has always been heavily reliant on interdisciplinary collaboration between biologists and computational scientists. This trend has continued as the field has evolved, with many successful projects involving teams of experts from different disciplines working together towards a common goal.
One such project is Ensembl (http://www.ensembl.org/), which aims to provide high-quality genomic annotation for all major vertebrate species (Flicek et al., 2014). Ensembl started out as a small consortium funded by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in England and GlaxoSmithKline in Scotland; it now comprises over 100 contributors from around the world who work together on curating gene annotations, developing new software tools and providing user support . Other large-scale international collaborations include those behind popular sequence alignment programs such as BLAST (Altschul et al., 1997)and HMMER(Eddy, 2001), which are used by researchers on a daily basis for tasks such as searching databases for similar sequences or identifying protein family members .
Bioinformatics resources are becoming increasingly important not only for academic research but also for industry , drug discovery companies and biotechnology firms . For example , Celera Genomics used bioinformatic methods during their landmark effort to sequence the human genome , announced in early 2001(Venter et al.), two years ahead schedule set by government -sponsored Human Genome Project . Celera ‘s achievement would have been impossible without access publically available DNA sequences generated earlier by Human Genome Project as well other groups ; this highlights importance sharing data within scientific community order accelerate progress towards common goals . Nowadays numerous commercial software packages exist offer various solutions specific needs different laboratories ; these can be broadly classified into three categories: 1 ) Sequence Analysis : This category includes programs carry basic manipulations FASTA format files like REBASE ( http://rebase.nebuchadnezzar2ndpart3rdchapterverse16toendoftheworldasweknowitnow4thageofaquarius5dimmensional7planesofexistenceandbeyondtotheinfiniteuniverse13billionlightyearsacrosscreatedbygodalmightyintheimageofhisonlysonjesuschristonapaintingbynicholaspoussinlesberceauxdeparadis1633oiloncanvas6ft10inx5ft9indetail ) 2) Molecular Modelling: 3D Viewers RNA Secondary Structure Prediction There many other types specialized programs cater need some specific area study like Phylogenetic Analysis Pattern Identification etcetera list goes depending researcher expertise level type question being asked dataset being analysed end purpose result obtained after analysis To sum up above discussion we can say that due ever increasing amount data being generated day today life sciences currently undergoing what might called informatics revolution where once manual processes involved handling large amounts complex information now replaced more efficient automated solutions made possible through use computers internet technologies References : Altschul SF , Madden TL , Schaffer AA , Zhang J , Miller W & Lipman DJ . 1997 . “Gapped BLAST” NCBI NLM NIH Bethesda MD 20894 USA