Cambridge, MA (PRWEB) March 9, 2010—At a gathering of life science researchers, bioinformatics developers, and computational biologists, GenomeQuest today announced a comprehensive Application Programming Interface (API) to its fast-growing sequence data management (SDM) platform. With this addition, life science organizations get, for the first time, a complete and cloud-enabled solution for researchers and developers to manage sequence data across their enterprise.
The GenomeQuest platform, already in use for mission-critical research at 17 of the top 20 pharmaceutical firms, allows researchers to compare, mine, share, and aggregate their sequence data, annotations, and findings—all from a web-browser and while accessing the world’s largest collection of sequence reference databases. With the new API, bioinformatics developers and computational biologists can:
* Configure and customize their SDM to support all their research and clinical workflows on top of the “embarrassingly parallel” GenomeQuest Engine
* Unify and cloud-enable their SDM across all users, instruments, tools, databases, projects, and organizations
* Scale their SDM to large-scale workflows—including broad-based support of next generation sequencing and secure, cloud-level sharing of sequence data and results.
Richard Resnick, GenomeQuest Vice President of Software and Professional Services, comments, “Bioinformatics developers and computational biologists have a clear vision and appreciate the power of SDM broadly applied to their organizations, but too often are stuck on the tedious tasks of managing the underlying data and building custom interactions for end users. We feel that GenomeQuest and its new API can accelerate the realization of their vision by handling the mundane data management and giving them the freedom to innovate.” Resnick concludes, “In the end, it’s about adding competitive advantage to their research and clinical groups and enabling them to thrive in the new era of genomics-powered discovery.”
Bill Farmerie, Associate Director at the Interdisciplinary Center for Biotechnology Research at the University of Florida, says, “Our in-house bioinformatics and computational team are a unique and highly talented resource. We want them to have access to the best systems available so they, in turn, can provide world-class services to our researcher clients.” He continues, “I feel that, because the GenomeQuest platform and its API manage the administrative and scaling issues in SDM, our bioinformatics team can therefore spend more time truly consulting with researchers and helping them discover the answers that lie in the data—clearly the highest and best use of their time and talents.”
The new GenomeQuest API provides full access to and control of the full range of SDM services, including engine-level sequence comparisons, workflow-level configuration/customization, and cloud-level administration and sharing.
The GenomeQuest Engine was started by the company’s Chief Scientific Officer Dr. Jean-Jacques Codani, in the 1990s to support the Human Genome Project. Since then, he and his French team have consistently advanced this core technology which now offers market-leading, high-performance capabilities, including:
* Comparison and management of genomic sequences with native database-to-database compare
* A unified sequence and annotation data model
* Multi-algorithm alignment and comparison including gapped, non-gapped, and local/global alignments
* Universal support for all sequencing platforms and inherent support for SAM/BAM
* Built-in parallelism: multi-threaded and distributed (tested to over 1000 nodes)
* Interactive sequence/result querying, sorting, grouping, formatting, and saving
* Results reusable as input sequence databases
* Linkable databases: viewing multiple databases as one virtual database
* A complete and expressive scripting language, designed for genomics
* Integration into GenomeQuest SDM, including cloud-enabled administration and sharing
The cloud-level support from the API provides developers with all the services they need—including computing, user/group administration, and data storage, sharing and security—to innovate on the cloud and securely publish workflows and applications to extended communities.
Manuel Duval, principal scientist at Pfizer, Inc. (NYSE: PFE), comments, “I agree that the GenomeQuest API will help expand the application of SDM and genomics-based discovery at Pfizer and, in turn, support our move to personalized, molecular-based approaches to treatments. We’ll use it to customize GenomeQuest to our specific needs, including piping sequence results to third-party graphical tools and eventually interfacing to system biology applications.”
The GenomeQuest API applies to organizations across the life science market, including pharmaceuticals, agricultural companies, biotech firms, genome service centers, core labs, and instrument manufacturers. GenomeQuest CEO Ron Ranauro comments, “At a pure business-level, we feel that GenomeQuest and the new API—as a commercial solution—have much to offer life science organizations. They are each looking to expand innovation and, simultaneously, transition fixed costs to variable costs. From a strategic standpoint, this is precisely where GenomeQuest adds immense value and demonstrable ROI.”
A full description and listing of the GenomeQuest APIs is available at no charge to bioinformatics developers and computational biologists at the GenomeQuest API wiki. The company is also hosting a series of GenomeQuest API Introduction Seminars, including at the XGEN Congress in San Diego on March 17, 2010, and the ABRF Conference in Sacramento on March 23, 2010. Attendees to these seminars earn full tuition credit ($1,995) for the upcoming GenomeQuest API Orientation Workshop. A full listing of seminar dates and locations is available on the GenomeQuest events page.
About GenomeQuest
GenomeQuest, the leader in sequence data management (SDM) helps genomic researchers and their organizations make great discoveries far faster. Over 160 leading life science companies use GenomeQuest for mission-critical work, including 17 of the top 20 pharmaceuticals.
Using GenomeQuest, organizations improve the performance of their discovery process and broadly prepare for next generation sequencing (NGS). Researchers perform discoveries, manage and share sequence data, and access the world’s largest collection of reference databases from a web-browser and personalized dashboard. Bioinformatics managers customize discovery workflows and unify their sequence data environment using the open platform. IT and business managers efficiently scale to broad utilization of next generation sequencing in their discovery operations using the GQ-Engine.
