Increasing Access To Bioinformatics Resources: Increase Community Curation by Increasing Your Community

Abstract

The amount of biological data has risen exponentially over the last decade. Along with this rise, the number and types of bioinformatics resources has risen such that the sheer number of bioinformatics resources is overwhelming. For these resources to attain their full potential, they must be efficiently and extensively utilized. But in such a plethora of resources, how does a researcher new to a field find the resources that will meet their needs. Once a resource is found, how does the researcher quickly learn to utilize that resource fully? There are resource lists such as those provided by the journal Nucleic Acid Research (NAR), BioMed Central and the Univ. of Pittsburgh Health Sciences Library, and most resources include their own documentation. But lists and site documentation don’t always cast a wide enough net to catch all users. For a resource to truly maximize their user community, it often takes multiple different outreach approaches. OpenHelix specializes in providing customized outreach services to bioinformatics resources, including those featured on this poster. Based on the conclusions from our Phase I SBIR grant, which tested the efficiency of several methods for training researchers on the use of genomic resources, OpenHelix ("www.openhelix.com":http://www.openhelix.com) has developed, and currently provides up-to-date online training materials on a large number of bioinformatics resources, covering major providers and research areas. Through a Phase II SBIR grant from NHGRI and other funding, we are developing a search portal for online bioinformatics resources. With the search portal, researchers will be able to find the bioinformatics and genomics online databases and resources most relevant to their needs. The search portal will contain an index of hundreds of the most popular and powerful resources, as well as the content of over 100 OpenHelix tutorials. Using various ranking techniques, the portal will be able to provide more relevant results than a simple keyword search. Additionally, as part of an extension of our Phase II grant, we are providing a sponsored suite of Model Organism Database trainings that include GBrowse, FlyBase, MGI, RGD, SGD, WormBase and ZFIN. We are also developing, and will be offering, sponsored live trainings on resources at NCBI as a way of filling the void left by the demise of the NCBI Field Guide outreach programs. Conclusion: OpenHelix aims to increase community curation by helping resources increase their user community