Bioinformatics Resource Centers
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (DMID) recognizes the challenge posed by bioterrorism, the re-emergence of disease due to drug-resistant variants of known pathogens, and the emergence of disease cause by previously unknown organisms. DMID has established eight Bioinformatics Resource Centers (BRCs) to provide information technology (IT) support for experimental studies of NIAID Category A-C priority pathogens, pathogens causing emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, and invertebrate vectors of infectious diseases. The BRCs will provide both central repositories for a wide variety of scientific data on these pathogenic microorganisms and platforms for software tools that support investigator-driven data analysis. For more information, see a description of the BRC program funded by NIAID.
is one web site that provides access to the data from all eight of the Bioinformatics Resource Centers (BRCs). In addition, this site lists upcoming meetings, conferences and workshops at which the individual BRCs will be presented as well as ftp access to software tools developed and used by each BRC.
The National Microbial Pathogen Data Resource is a center for comparative analysis and systems biology utilizing all publicly available, complete genome sequences. NMPDR curators annotate within biological subsystems and across genomes, with special focus on accurate functional assignments for pathogenic species of: Campylobacter, Listeria, Staphylococcus, Streptococcus, and Vibrio.
The Enteropathogen Resource Integration Center is a resource for five members of the family Enterobacteriaceae including: diarrheagenic E. coli, Shigella, Salmonella, Yersinia enterocolitica, and Yersinia pestis.
The PathoSystems Resource Integration Center provides a comprehensive and accurate web-based resource for genomic and associated information for several bacterial and viral pathogens: Brucella, Coxiella, Rickettsia, Caliciviridae, Coronavirus, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis E, and Lyssavirus.
Pathema contains in depth curatorial analysis of six target organisms: Bacillus anthracis, Clostridium botulinum, Burkholderia mallei, Burkholderia pseudomallei, Clostridium perfringens, and Entamoeba histolytica.
The BioDefense Public Health Database includes a diverse group of priority pathogens: influenza virus, Francisella tularensis, Mycobacteria, and Microsporidia.
The Viral Bioinformatics Resource Center is primarily focused on the following viral families: Arenavirdae, Bunyaviridae, Flaviviridae, Filoviridae, Paramyxoviridae, Poxviridae, and Togaviridae.
The Apicomplexan Database provides a single point of access to CryptoDB, PlasmoDB and ToxoDB, which focus on the curation of Plasmodium, Cryptosporidium, and Toxoplasma species, respectively.
VectorBase provides genomic information for invertebrate vectors of human pathogens such as A. gambiae, A. funestus, A. aegypti, C. pipiens, and I. scapularis.
(Information and extracted content courtesy of respective websites listed above.)