Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Conclusion: The End of Bioinformatics
We have followed the data: out of physics, through the
spaces of laboratories, through networks and databases,
and into images and published scientifi c papers. This ap-
proach has allowed us to see how biological work and
biological knowledge is shaped and textured by digital
infrastructures. Rather than just being speeded up or liq-
uefi ed or virtualized, we have seen how data, along with
the structures they inhabit, tie biology to the everyday
practices of biologists and the computational tools they
use, albeit in new ways. Biological knowledge now de-
pends on virtual spaces, production lines, databases, and
visualization software.
In the end, what difference does all this make to our
understanding of life? In the fi rst place, it has diverted
the attention of biologists toward sequence. This is not as
simple a claim as it may at fi rst seem. Computers are data
processing machines, and sequences have come to the fore
by virtue of their status as data. The notion of sequence
has become inseparable from its role as data; it must
move and interact and be stored as data. The ubiquity
of data has carved out a new signifi cance for statistics in
biology: computers imported statistical approaches from
physics that have allowed sequences to be treated statisti-
cally and to be manipulated, rearranged, and related to
one another in ways not possible without computers. Se-
