Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!bionet!lanl.gov!cb%intron
From: cb%intron@LANL.GOV (Christian Burks)
Newsgroups: bionet.molbio.genbank
Subject: Re:  What's in EMBL that's not in GenBank?
Message-ID: <8907161857.AA18062@intron.lanl.gov>
Date: 16 Jul 89 18:57:37 GMT
Sender: daemon@NET.BIO.NET
Lines: 20

In terms of historical data, there's very little (a handful of citations)
that are in one database but not in the other.  Both databases put
out quarterly releases that are approximately interleaved; since each
database grows by roughly 20% each release, and assuming that a share
of that comes from in house entry and a share from the other database,
it means that each database contains about 10% (or so) that isn't
in the other database for 6 weeks or so after the release.

bottom line: if you're desparate for all that's very recently been
published, and don't have access to the EMBL network server (where
the interleaving lags are done away with), then you will gain 1-2
months head start on 10% or less of the data by subscribing
to both.

note that EMBL, GenBank, and DDBJ are working reducing these numbers
even further, both through mechanisms like the EMBL e-mail server
(GenBank will soon have a similar service through on-line dial-up access),
and through real-time updating of the data at the various sites.

- Christian Burks