BOL: Related items

The Day We Began Reading the DNA of the World

Jitendra Narayan — Sat, 05 Sep 2026 01:43:21 -0500

Picture waking up and knowing that in one lab, a scientist is reading the DNA of a whale. In another, a team is sequencing a rare plant. Meanwhile, researchers in India are decoding the genomes of different human populations.

Many organisms. Many countries. All share one remarkable goal: to understand the genetic story of life.

DNA is nature's instruction manual, written with just four letters: A, T, C, and G. For years, scientists could only read small sections of this huge book. Now, new sequencing technology lets us read entire genomes like never before.

One of the most ambitious projects is the Earth BioGenome Project (EBP). Its goal is to create reference genomes for about 1.5 million known eukaryotic species. This project links genome research across continents, species, and scientific fields.

But this story goes beyond just animals and plants.

A New Chapter in Human Genomics

Large human genome projects are changing how we understand our own genetic diversity.

India's GenomeIndia project has sequenced thousands of people from different populations. This work is uncovering genetic variation that global databases have often missed.

Similar population-scale effSimilar large-scale projects are happening worldwide. The All of Us Research Program in the United States, Europe's 1+ Million Genomes initiative, South Korea's national genomic data program, and projects in Saudi Arabia, Australia, and Singapore are all building huge genomic resources.collect DNA.

The real goal is to link genomes with health, disease, and other biological information. This creates a base for more accurate research and, in time, more personalized medicine.

A Race Against Time

There is also an important twist.

We are sequencing Earth's biodiversity even as many species face growing environmental threats.

A genome alone cannot save a species, but it does keep important information about its biology, evolution, and genetic diversity. This knowledge helps scientists understand risks, guide conservation, and find traits that could help agriculture or medicine.

Projects like the Darwin Tree of Life, which studies species in Britain and Ireland, and the African BioGenome Project, which is growing genomics work across Africa, are key parts of this worldwide effort.

Projects to Watch

Earth BioGenome Project (EBP) - A global effort to sequence and annotate roughly 1.5 million known eukaryotic species and create a comprehensive reference library of Earth's biodiversity.
Vertebrate Genomes Project (VGP) - Focuses on producing high-quality reference genomes for vertebrate species, providing a major foundation for the wider Tree of Life.
Darwin Tree of Life - A UK and Ireland initiative aiming to sequence approximately 70,000 species, creating a detailed genomic map of regional biodiversity.
African BioGenome Project (AfricaBP) - A pan-African initiative focused on sequencing Africa's biodiversity while strengthening genomics and bioinformatics capacity across the continent.
European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA) - A European effort to generate high-quality reference genomes for Europe's biodiversity and connect national sequencing efforts.
Canada BioGenome Project - Building reference genomes for Canadian biodiversity, supporting conservation, research and the study of ecosystems.
California Conservation Genomics Project - Uses genomics to understand and protect California's biodiversity and help inform conservation decisions.
Bat1K - An ambitious global effort to sequence the genomes of all known bat species, helping scientists study their evolution, longevity, immunity and unique biology.
Bird 10,000 (B10K) - A global project aiming to create genome resources covering the world's bird diversity and reconstruct avian evolutionary history.
Global Invertebrate Genomics Alliance (GIGA) - Builds genomic resources for the enormous and genetically diverse world of invertebrates.
GenomeIndia - India's national human-genome initiative, designed to capture the country's extraordinary population diversity and create a reference resource for Indian genomics.
All of Us Research Program - A US national research program combining genomic information with health and lifestyle data at population scale.
1+ Million Genomes / Genome of Europe - A European effort to enable secure, cross-border use of genomic and health data and develop genome-scale resources involving more than one million people.
Korea National Integrated Bio Big Data Project - South Korea's large-scale national effort combining genomic and health information from a very large population cohort.
Saudi Genome Program - A national genomics initiative focused on genetic diseases, population genomics and precision medicine in Saudi Arabia.
Australian Genomics / Genomics Health Futures Mission - Australia's growing investment in genomic medicine, rare disease research and population-scale health genomics.

The Library of Life

The fuThe future of genomics is not just about sequencing one genome at a time. Now, it is about creating a worldwide network of genomes—human and non-human, individual and species—linked by powerful databases and advanced computational tools.ine a library without shelves.

In this library, the books are genomes. The pages are made of DNA. Scientists and machines are the readers. And this library is still being written. Each genome sequenced today adds a new page to the story of life and helps us better understand our place in it.

Is reference genome necessary for gene expression study in transcriptome sequencing or for variant discovery in genome sequencing?

Rahul Agarwal — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 15:25:09 -0500

Like in case of plant genomes where nature of genome is too complex and huge in size to accomplish complete de novo assembly by current sequencing technology. What would be alternate solution? Can we live in reference free world?

Genomics and Personalized Medicine

Sun, 01 Jun 2014 23:38:42 -0500

(October 20, 2009) Michael Snyder, Professor of Genetics and Chair of the Department of Genetics at Stanford, discusses advances in gene sequencing, the impact of genomics on medicine, the potential for personalized medicine. and efforts at Stanford to further study these issues. Stanford Mini Med School is a series arranged and directed by Stanford's School of Medicine, and presented by the Stanford Continuing Studies program. Featuring more than thirty distinguished, faculty, scientists and physicians from Stanford's medical school, the series offers students a dynamic introduction to the world of human biology, health and disease, and the groundbreaking changes taking place in medical research and health care. Stanford University http://www.stanford.edu Stanford University School of Medicine http://med.stanford.edu Stanford Continuing Studies http://continuingstudies.stanford.edu Stanford University Channel on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/stanford

Sorghum genome Sequenced!!

Jit — Sun, 01 Sep 2013 19:46:18 -0500

Sorghum, a staple food for 500 million resource-poor people in marginal environments and a model for other important crops, sorghum holds vital genetic resources as humanity confronts the nexus of food crisis and climate change. The recent research provides an unmatched resource to respond to these challenges by identifying a large high-quality SNP and indel data set in diverse sorghum genotypes.

In addition to providing a broad sample of the diversity in S. bicolor, the genotypes included in this study are known to display agronomically important traits including stay-green drought resistance, insect resistance, grain size and grain quality.

Find more at http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2013/130827/ncomms3320/full/ncomms3320.html

Adhoc Bioinformatics Faculty Position @ NIT

Tue, 03 Jun 2014 16:19:52 -0500

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, DEPARTMENT OF BIOTECHNOLOGY, WARANGAL – 506 021, Andhra Pradesh

No.NITW/BT/2014/adhoc

APPLICATIONS ARE INVITED FOR THE APPOINTMENT OF ADHOC FACULTY ON CONTRACT BASIS IN THE DEAPARTMENT OF BIOTECHNOLOGY

Period of Contract: Initially the appointment is for one semester i.e., from July 2014 up to December 2014 only.

Essential Qualifications:

i) B. Tech or equivalent in Biotechnology/ Industrial Biotechnology/ Biochemical Engineering / Chemical Engg. Or M. Sc in Microbiology/ Botany/ Zoology/ Biochemistry/Biotechnology and ii) M. Tech or equivalent in Biotechnology/Industrial Biotechnology/Bioinformatics

Integrated M. Tech in Biotechnology/Industrial Biotechnology/ Bioinformatics

Candidates must possess First class (60% aggregate marks or 6.5 CGPA) at B. Tech/ M. Sc and M. Tech.

Desirable: Ph. D Pay Package: All selected candidates shall be eligible for a consolidated pay of Rs.30, 000/- per month. Candidates with Ph. D shall be eligible for an additional amount of Rs.5, 000/- per month.

How to apply : Applications on plain paper with attested photocopies of certificate and bio data along with justification for eligibility should reach to the Head, Department of Biotechnology, National Institute of Technology, Warangal AP 506004 in the form of soft or hard copy on or before 21st June 2014 email : biotech_hod@nitw.ac.in

Intimation: No separate call letters will be sent to the candidates. All the eligible candidates will be notified in the institute web site on 23rd June 2014. All the eligible candidates are requested to report for the interview to the Head, Department of Biotechnology at 9:00 AM on 27th June 2014

Joining: Selected candidates will be informed and they are expected to join immediately.

http://www.nitw.ac.in/nitw/announcements/2014/Bio-Adhoc%20Advt.%20May-2014.pdf

Genetics, epigenetics and disease

Fri, 27 Sep 2013 11:32:55 -0500

Royal Society GlaxoSmithKline Prize Lecture given by Professor Adrian Bird CBE FMedSci FRS on Tuesday 22 January 2013. Adrian Bird CBE FMedSci FRS is the Buchanan Chair of Genetics at the University of Edinburgh. The human genome sequence has been available for more than a decade, but its significance is still not fully understood. While most human genes have been identified, there is much to learn about the DNA signals that control them. This lecture described an unusually short DNA sequence, just two base pairs long, CG, which occurs in several chemically different forms. Defects in signalling by CG are implicated in disease. For example, the autism spectrum disorder Rett syndrome is caused by loss of a protein that reads methylated CG and affects the activity of genes. The Royal Society GlaxoSmithKline Prize Lecture is awarded for original contributions to medical and veterinary sciences published within ten years from the date of the award.

Search Shell Command History

Rahul Nayak — Thu, 12 Jun 2014 17:43:34 -0500

We use couple of hundreads of command in daily basis. Most of them are actually repeated several time. The question remain open how do I search old command history under bash shell and modify or reuse it?

Now a days almost all modern shell allows you to search command history if enabled by user. Use history command to display the history list with line numbers. Lines listed with with a * have been modified by user.

Shell history search command

Type history at a shell prompt:
$ history

It will display the list of all used commandline history with an serial number.

To search particular command, enter:
$ history | grep command-name
$ history | egrep -i 'scp|ssh|ftp'
Emacs Line-Edit Mode Command History Searching

To get previous command containing string, hit [CTRL]+[r] followed by search string:

(reverse-i-search):

To get previous command, hit [CTRL]+[p]. You can also use up arrow key.

CTRL-p

To get next command, hit [CTRL]+[n]. You can also use down arrow key.

CTRL-n

fc command

Apart from hostory command there are fc command to extract the command from history. The fc stands for either "find command" or "fix command.

For example list last 10 command, enter:
$ fc -l 10
To list commands 130 through 150, enter:
$ fc -l 130 150
To list all commands since the last command beginning with ssh, enter:
$ fc -l ssh
You can edit commands 1 through 5 using vi text editor, enter:
$ fc -e vi 1 5

Delete command history

The -c option causes the history list to be cleared by deleting all of the entries:
$ history -c

Alien Genome !!!

Jit — Sat, 13 Dec 2014 00:24:32 -0600

Genome sequencing, analysis and expression of Alien genome.

Note: This image/cartoon is create only for fun. It has nothing to do with any scientific findings.

Bioinformatician’s Pocket Reference !!

RAJESH DETROJA — Sun, 08 Jun 2014 09:56:58 -0500

It is amusing how brain of bioinformaticians work! Learning a new programming language for days feels so much of fun that making 5 minute discussion with neighbours (unless under special circumstances!) in our own mother-tongue. Today every bioinformatician keeps more than few languages and core IT toolkits on their plate. It has become mandatory to be able to mould different code snippets to build our own custom workflows, and thus keeping syntax at our fingertips has become essential.Although Google is best way to get syntax problem solved, it is not a bad idea to keep reference sheets is our smartphones or stick out some printed sheets on the back of your door, in the old fashion way!!

Address of the bookmark: http://infoplatter.wordpress.com/2014/04/06/bioinformaticians-pocket-reference/

Genome Annotation Transfer Utility (GATU)

Jit — Mon, 29 May 2017 05:54:53 -0500

Genome Annotation Transfer Utility (GATU) was designed to facilitate quick, efficient annotation of similar genomes using genomes that have already been annotated. For example, whenever a new strain of SARS coronavirus is sequenced, it is possible, using GATU, to automatically annotate the new strain using a previously-annotated strain of SARS CoV. This saves researchers from tedious manual annotation of these sequences.

The program utilizes tBLASTn and BLASTn algorithms to map genes from the reference genome (the annotated strain) to the new sequence (the unannotated strain). The goal is to annotate the majority of the new genome’s genes in a single step. ORFs present in the target genome and absent from the reference genome are also identified; these ORFs can be further analyzed using BLAST, VGO and BBB. Afterwards, they can either be accepted for/rejected from annotation. GATU can handle multiple-exon genes as well as mature peptides. Although it was designed for use with viral genomes, GATU can also be used to help annotate larger genomes (ie. bacterial genomes).

The output is saved in GenBank, XML, or EMBL file format.

Address of the bookmark: https://virology.uvic.ca/help/tool-help/help-books/genome-annotation-transfer-utility-gatu-documentation/