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Scientists Establish Gene Site
A gene database website established by local scientists officially opened yesterday.
The scientists said the site is a specific measure to spread knowledge of genes and increase scientific co-operation in the field.
The database, at www.bioshino.org, currently contains 100,000 human, animal, and plant DNA sequences.
The database will also allow the registration of new gene findings by Chinese scientists, said Zhao Guoping, deputy director of the Shanghai Biological Sciences Information Center.
Zhao said the database, co-established by his center and the Shanghai-based China Human (South) Genome Center (CHGCS), will help Chinese scientists to avoid redundancy in their research and to improve co-operation.
DNA databases are not a new feature of world gene research.
According to Han Zheguang, a researcher for the CHGCS, on-line databases have been established in America, Europe and Japan and "all of them are connected to each other and their information is open to the public."
In Shanghai, a private company declared the establishment of its own on-line gene database early in May registering about 40 billion gene sequences in the database.
"Most of our data are also open to the public for free, including 90 per cent of the data discovered only by our company," said Qing Yilong, general manager of United Gene Development Company started up by several Fudan University professors.
"The reason the Shanghai government initiated another on-line gene database is in case our scientists are denied access to the foreign databases," Zhao said.
Han said he thought the main reason behind the site is to enable more scientists in China, some of whom have difficulties reading scientific reports in English, to get the newest information in Chinese and to register their new findings more efficiently.
"It has been made clear that gene data should be used for public benefit," Han said. "No matter in foreign websites or private websites, the data should be accessible for free."
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