Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!genbank!bionet!embl.bitnet!FUCHS
From: FUCHS@embl.bitnet ("Rainer Fuchs ", EMBL)
Newsgroups: bionet.general
Subject: Re: Genome Data Submission and NIH Policy
Message-ID: <8911141641.AA08811@net.bio.net>
Date: 14 Nov 89 12:56:00 GMT
Sender: daemon@NET.BIO.NET
Lines: 54


 Rob Harper wrote in a previous message:

>    Submission could either be by disk or by E-mail. In either case what
>    would be a good idea would be a programme to help researchers fill in
>    their data in an acceptable form for either EMBL or Genbank... so that
>    the anotators would only need to do a mimimum amount to work to get the
>    data into the database.
>
>    Suggestions:
>       1) Network addresses for submission of data
>       2) Programme to simplify the codifying of data
>       3) Programme available of some server for downloading.

 Data submission to EMBL via e-mail is already becoming more and more
 popular. Computer-readable submission forms are available from the EMBL file
 server. For details on e-mail submissions just send a short message to
 DATALIB@EMBL.

 A program to facilitate data input by researchers themselves is currently
 being developed by Genbank/IG. But I don't share Rob's enthusiasm about such
 kind of a program. The main problem is not to get the data in a preprocessed
 form, but to get them *at all*. At EMBL (and I guess, at GenBank too) we
 waste much effort by scanning journals and entering sequence data from
 published articles. Unfortunately, not all publishers are willing to
 collaborate by making accession numbers mandatory for publication.

 I am not sure whether a data entry program would actually help us very much.
 A "normal" scientist produces sequence data not so frequently that he will
 become familiar with this program. So it's much more work for him to enter
 the data using his computer than to fill in a submission form manually. The
 situation may change when the genome project will produce output, so that
 sequence data will arise daily. But then, the amount of data will make it
 impractible for a scientist to enter them into a submission program. We
 should rather think about ways to cooperate with manufacturers of sequencing
 machines to include appropriate software directly in their machines.

 I think that at the moment a submission program will not help us very much,
 and that in the future we need much more sophisticated means of data entry
 and submission than a simple data entry program.

 Rainer

 Disclaimer: this is my personal opinion and is in no way representative for
 the whole EMBL Data Libray

 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Rainer Fuchs, Ph.D.                          | Post:    EMBL Data Library
                                              |          European Molecular
 EARN/Bitnet: fuchs@embl.bitnet               |          Biology Laboratory
 Internet: fuchs%embl.bitnet@cunyvm.cuny.edu  |          Meyerhofstr. 1
                                              |          D-6900 Heidelberg
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