Bioinformatics and its Scope

Bioinformatics and its Scope

Bioinformatics uses advances in the area of computer science, information science, computer and information technology, communication technology to solve complex problems in life sciences and particularly in biotechnology. Data capture, data warehousing and data mining have become major issues for bio-technologists and biological scientists due to sudden growth in quantitative data in biology such as complete genomes of biological species including human genome, protein sequences, protein 3-D structures, metabolic pathways databases, cell line & hybridoma information, biodiversity related information. Advancements in information technology, particularly the Internet, are being used to gather and access ever-increasing information in biology and biotechnology.

Functional genomics, proteomics, discovery of new drugs and vaccines molecular diagnostic kits and pharmacogenomics are some of the areas in which bioinformatics has become an integral part of Research & Development. The knowledge of multimedia databases, tools to carry out data analysis and modeling of molecules and biological systems on computer workstations as well as in a network environment has become essential for any student of Bioinformatics, Bioinformatics, the multidisciplinary area, has grown so much that one divides it into molecular bioinformatics, organal bioinformatics and species bioinformatics. Issues related to biodiversity and environment, cloning of higher animals such as Dolly and Polly, tissue culture and cloning of plants have brought out that Bioinformatics is not only a support branch of science but is also a subject that directs future course of research in biotechnology and life sciences.

The importance and usefulness of Bioinformatics is realized in last few years by many industries. Therefore , large Bioinformatics R & D divisions are being established in many pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology companies and even in other conventional industry dealing with biological. Bioinformatics is thus rated as number one career in the field of bio sciences.

In short, Bioinformatics deals with creation, data analysis and modeling. Data capturing is
data done not only from printed material but also from network resources. Databases in biology are generally in the multimedia form organized in relational database model. Modeling is only on single biological molecule also on multiple systems thus requiring performance
computing a use of high systems