[Pombelist] PomBase is officially launched today....

[Val Wood]

We are pleased to announce that a preview version of PomBase
(www.pombase.org), the new model organism database for the fission yeast
Schizosaccharomyces pombe, is now available for testing and feedback.

PomBase now includes data from the legacy GeneDB S. pombe database, as
well as new data types and features that were not previously supported.
Gene overview pages present the curated and inferred data related to a
gene, including the gene type, product, sequence features, phenotypes,
Gene Ontology annotation, protein family data, modifications and
physical and genetic interactions (from BioGRID).

The gene overview pages link to an interactive Ensembl-style genome
browser which supports the display of genome-wide sequence-level
features. Ensembl can store and display a wide variety of datasets
mapped to the genome either from internal sources or via externally
loaded URLs or data files. Individual data tracks can be configured to
show datasets of interest.

PomBase offers simple and advanced search interfaces; in the advanced
search (www.pombase.org/spombe/query/builder) a query builder allows
users to search by multiple feature types. A query history summarises
queries and allows queries to be combined and edited. Results pages
provide access to gene overview pages and allow gene lists to be
downloaded.

Development of PomBase and data curation are ongoing, and future
announcements will highlight new features, routes for data submission,
availability of high-throughput data tracks, community curation, Ensembl
tutorials, and more.

PomBase is a collaborative project between the University of Cambridge,
the European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI), University College London, and
funded by the Wellcome Trust. You can read more about the resource  in the
Nucleic Acids Research Database issue
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=22039153

Thank you to all of the people involved, and specifically the PomBase team
Mark McDowall - Ensembl database and PomBase website developer
Kim Rutherford - Chado (curation) database and curation tool developer
Midori Harris - Curator and phenotype ontology developer
Antonia Lock - Curator

We welcome any feedback, positive or negative, on the new website and
its contents. Please send your comments and suggestions  to
helpdesk at pombase.org