Accelerating Genome Analysis, A*STAR Study
Updated software SIFT 4G can further research in human health, the study of biological processes and agricultural products
SINGAPORE – An international team of scientists, led by researchers from A*STAR’s Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS) and the Bioinformatics Institute (BII), have developed SIFT 4G (SIFT for Genomes) – a software that can lead to faster genome analysis. This development was published in the scientific journal Nature Protocols.
Genome sequencing has been instrumental in improving knowledge of human diseases, by allowing scientists to understand their underlying biological mechanisms. It has also been critical in the global push towards precision medicine, where the genetic profile of a disease or patient could improve clinical decision-making in determining prognoses and the type of treatment prescribed for patients, paving the way for improved healthcare outcomes.
While technological advances have enabled the generation of vast amounts of data on the human body and other organisms, an issue facing the scientific community is the ability to analyse such great amounts of data well.
Based on the same principles as its predecessor, SIFT 4G can prepare predictions for genomes at a much higher speed. Once the predictions are ready, they are stored in a database and are ready for genome analysis. The use of graphics processing units (GPUs) instead of central processing units (CPUs) has resulted in much shorter prediction times and the ability to construct databases for a large number of organisms. SIFT 4G already has predictions available for more than 200 organisms, thereby serving a larger research community.
SINGAPORE – An international team of scientists, led by researchers from A*STAR’s Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS) and the Bioinformatics Institute (BII), have developed SIFT 4G (SIFT for Genomes) – a software that can lead to faster genome analysis. This development was published in the scientific journal Nature Protocols.
Genome sequencing has been instrumental in improving knowledge of human diseases, by allowing scientists to understand their underlying biological mechanisms. It has also been critical in the global push towards precision medicine, where the genetic profile of a disease or patient could improve clinical decision-making in determining prognoses and the type of treatment prescribed for patients, paving the way for improved healthcare outcomes.
While technological advances have enabled the generation of vast amounts of data on the human body and other organisms, an issue facing the scientific community is the ability to analyse such great amounts of data well.
Based on the same principles as its predecessor, SIFT 4G can prepare predictions for genomes at a much higher speed. Once the predictions are ready, they are stored in a database and are ready for genome analysis. The use of graphics processing units (GPUs) instead of central processing units (CPUs) has resulted in much shorter prediction times and the ability to construct databases for a large number of organisms. SIFT 4G already has predictions available for more than 200 organisms, thereby serving a larger research community.