The National Center for Genome Resources has released an updated version of the ISYS platform for the integration of heterogeneous bioinformatics resources. The release is freely available on the NCGR website (www.ncgr.org/research/isys).
Although the full users’ release is not expected until spring 2001, co-project leader Adam Siepel said that the most recent version is a “preview” of the functionality that will be available.
ISYS is written in Java and integrates bioinformatics tools and algorithms developed separately by specialists in their own areas of expertise.
The current release offers an expanded set of components and refinements, including transparent access to NCBI’s Entrez and BLAST servers and refined versions of NCGR’s Sequence Viewer, Similarity Searcher, and Table Viewer. The ISYS developers have also wrapped versions of the maxdView gene expression viewer and the BDGP Gene Ontology Browser for use with the platform.
NCGR intends to keep the platform freely available for academic and non-profit users. Siepel said there would be a separate arrangement for commercial users, though the terms of the arrangement have not been worked out yet.
The system will be featured in an upcoming research article in the journal Bioinformatics.