introduction
The 2005 global revenues of publicly traded biotechnology companies have grown by 18.1% to $63.1 billion (Donn, 2006). Many countries are now investing in research and development in the biotechnology industry as it is believed this 30 year-old industry is moving toward profitability. The stock value in this industry has outperformed the average stock value in many countries. In the pre-genomic era, a typical life sciences company would have marketed diagnostic kits, assays, chemicals, measuring equipment, and research products to name a few. In the genomic era, a new range of products is marketed focusing on molecular medicine. Among these new products are bioinformatics software solutions, storage systems, biotechnology systems, and solutions researching into genes and proteins, tools for analysis of genetic sequence data, integrated systems and solutions for disease research, and new drug discovery (Cader, 2004). The need for biotechnology portals is now more than justified and will be a useful information and knowledge source.
A biotechnology portal is a gateway of comprehensive source of information and knowledge to those interested in knowing about biotechnology and the benefits this industry is offering. It should be considered as the first point of reference for those seeking reliable, quality, and current information and knowledge about issues in biotechnology. In addition, it should be interactive and have the appropriate tools to enable a community of users to share information and knowledge among them. There should also be a commercial component to the biotechnology portal, which should be to generate revenue through advertisements and offers to its target visitors. This revenue is essential to ensure the maintenance and survival of the portal and offer value to all its stakeholders. A biotechnology portal will not be complete unless it provides information on biotechnology stocks to potential investors seeking insights into this industry. A biotechnology portal is like any online business with various objectives such as profits, growth, market share, and innovation.
biotechnology in medicine
This article will concentrate on biotechnology in medicine although the benefits of biotechnology have influenced other disciplinary areas such as agriculture and environmental sciences. In medicine, hundreds of biotechnology drug products and vaccines are currently in human clinical trials in advanced countries with many more in the new product development stage.
Linking to Web Sites
A good starting point is to link up with the site http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Human Genome Program. This site gives information on the Human Genome Project (HGP), news and announcements, planned user facilities, educational resources, research progress, impacts of research, GTL documents (potential microbial documents), science, technologies behind GTL, Gene Gateway (tools for exploring the sequence), and related department of energy sites. There are also links to related sites.
The biotechnology portal should also link up to an excellent Web site, which makes available several DNA and Gene images (http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/graphics/slides/images1.html) in an image gallery.
The Wellcome Foundation in the UK (http:// genome.wellcome.ac.uk/) gives the latest news, features, and background, and a lot of information about the human genome—exploring genes and its impact on health, disease, and society. The Wellcome foundation is also the primary funding source for the Sanger Institute at Cambridge University (http://www.sanger.ac.uk/). The Sanger Institute is a genome research institute whose aim is to further the knowledge of genomes, particularly through large scale sequencing and analysis.
Another interesting site in the UK that should be included is http://www.geneservice.co.uk/. Geneservice Limited is a contract research organisation and biological resource centre, which supplies genomic products and technical services to both academic and commercial research organisations. These services include whole genome amplification, DNA sequencing, micro-satellite, and SNP genotyping including 10K and 100K mapping, and expression array analysis.
An interesting European Web site is http:// www.litbio.org/. This is a Laboratory for Interdisciplinary Technologies in Bioinformatics (LITBIO) applied to genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics providing international research and development programs with the new analysis strategies of biomedical and biotechnological data. The laboratory consists of five collaborating partners whose links are listed as follows:
• CILEA (http://www.litbio.org/cilea.htm)
• CNR/IEIIT (http://www.litbio.org/ieiit.htm)
• Universita’ degli Studi di CAMERINO (http://www.litbio.org/camerino.htm)
• Universita’ degli Studi di GENOVA (http:// www.litbio.org/genova.htm
• Eurotech S.p.A. (http://www.litbio.org/eu-rotech.htm
Another interesting link is to this Japanese Web site http://www.genome.ad.jp/kegg/. The Kyoto Encyclopaedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) is a bioinformatics resource developed by the Kanehisa Laboratories in the Bioinformat-ics Center of Koyoto University and the Human Genome Center of the University of Tokyo. They are working toward representing a complete computer representation of the cell, the organism, and the biosphere. This will enable computational prediction of higher-level complexity of cellular processes and organism behaviours from genomic and molecular information.
The biotechnology portal should also be linked to other informative Web sites in other countries including the Australian Web sites.
This Web site (http://www.csiro.au/pub-genesite/index.htm) explains what Australian scientists are doing in the area of biotechnology research. For information about gene technology, policy, and regulations, there should be a link to biotechnology Australia’s gateway site at www. biotechnology.gov.au. Another useful link should be to the Victorian government biotechnology Web site. This Web site offers an overview of biotechnology in Victoria and links to industry sectors and biotechnology centres. It also includes the biotechnology strategic development plan for Victoria.
This Web site (http://www.business.vic.govau/BUSVIC.458954/INDUSTRY/1226260600/PC_60362.html) offers an overview of biotechnology in Victoria and links to industry sectors and biotechnology centres. It also includes the biotechnology strategic development plan for Victoria. Another useful link would be to http:// www.ausbiotech.org. Ausbiotech is the industry body representing the Australian biotechnology sector.
The molecular biology database collection is a public online resource listing key databases. The online version of this journal (Nucleic Acids Research) article has been published under an open access model (Galprin, 2006). The biotechnology portal must definitely be linked to this up-to-date database, which is intended to serve as the initial point from which to find specialised databases that may be of use in biological research. This database includes 858 updates in the 2006 version. It includes major public sequence repositories, gene expression, gene identification and structure, genetic and physical maps, genomic databases, intermolecular interactions, metabolic pathways and cellular regulations, mutation databases, pathology, protein databases, protein sequence motifs, proteome resources, retrieval systems and database structure, and varied biomedical content.
Icelandic’s “Decode Genetics”
This is an Icelandic biopharmaceutical company. Its Web site (http://www.decode.com/) shows the type of work it does. The nature of work became of much interest worldwide because the company started developing a genealogical database. When the information from this database is combined with health care data (diagnosis, treatment, prognosis, measurement of values in blood, etc.) it will help identify genes linked to certain diseases. The concept is to look at the community as a system of data that can be mined for knowledge.
Figure 1.
uk Biomedical Population collection
A similar study in the UK called ” UK Biomedical Population Collection” was established between the Wellcome Trust, the Medical Research Council, and the Department of Health, which looks at the interaction between lifestyle, environment, and genetic makeup that causes diseases. This project will collect key medical and lifestyle information from participants between the ages of 45 and 64 over a period of at least 10 years. The Web site associated with this study should also be linked to the biotechnology portal. Further details can be seen in http://www.phgu.org.uk/ecard?reference_ID=2688. stem cells, Embryonic stem cells, Embryonic stem cell Line, somatic stem cells
The National Health Institute Web site is a useful resource for all one wants to know about stem cells and the ensuing debate about stem cells research (http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/glossary.asp).
Apart from the previous National Health Institute (U.S.) Web site, another useful Web site to which the biotechnology portal should be linked is the National Human Genome Research Institute Web site (http://www.genome.gov/10004765). According to this Web site, the term “cloning” is used by scientists to describe many different processes that involve making duplicates of biological material. In most cases, isolated genes or cells are duplicated for scientific study and no new animal results. The experiment that led to the cloning of Dolly the sheep in 1997 was different. It used a cloning technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer and resulted in an animal that was a genetic twin—although delayed in time—of an adult sheep. This technique can also be used to produce an embryo from which cells called embryonic stem (ES) cells could be extracted to use in research into potential therapies for a wide variety of diseases. This Web site also discusses ethical concerns, policy and regulation, and cloning for the isolation of Human ES Cells.
content of the Biotechnology Portal
A good biotechnology portal should be innovative and interactive rather than just be a source of information. The design should be creative and welcoming to the browser. The content should offer quality material, which is regularly updated. The technology should enable the portal to be user friendly and fast.
conclusion
Mentioned above are only some of the possible links to the portals and Web sites of the numerous genomic and medical Web sites originating in almost every country. Eventually a good biotechnology portal will be a gateway to most of these Web sites. The portal should be linked to all the biotechnology hotspots in the world. The hotspots refer to biotechnology research centers and institutes involved in biotechnology research and development activities.
There are numerous other Web sites of private companies that should be liked to the biotechnology portal but they are too numerous to be mentioned here.
Agricultural and environmental aspects of biotechnology are also important components of a biotechnology portal. Other aspects are an executive search section for biotechnologists and links to online publications such as “nature,” “science,” “today’s life science” etc., to name a few of the many academic journals in biotechnology. For a biotechnology portal to be viable, it needs to offer advertising space for a fee for companies wanting to market related products and knowledge sources.
key terms
Bioinformatics: A new and exciting field, which developed due to the power of super computers enabling faster processing and storage of terabyte levels of data, using computer software tools in storing, organising, and computationally analysing biological information.
Biotechnology: It is the application of knowledge based on cellular and molecular processes of living organisms and its ability to act as molecular machines to make new proteins with the potential to become new drugs; to develop new industrial processes and new genetically modified high yielding crops. There is also a convergence of rapid advances in information technology with the rapidly growing knowledge of the cellular and molecular processes resulting in the new opportunities.
Biotechnology Portal: It is a gateway of a comprehensive source of information and knowledge to those interested in knowing about biotechnology and the benefits this industry is offering. It should be considered as the first point of reference for those seeking reliable, quality, and current information and knowledge about issues in biotechnology.
Chromosomes: The DNA molecule containing a cell’s genome. These strands of DNA form the 23 pairs of chromosomes inside the cell nucleus with approximately 3 billion DNA sub units or chemical base pairs called nucleic acids, denoted by the letters A, T, G, and C. Each pair of nucleic acid is called a base pair. These are like rungs on a spiralling staircase.
Cloning: The term cloning is used by scientists to describe many different processes that involve making duplicates of biological material. In most cases, isolated genes or cells are duplicated for scientific study, and no new animal results (http:// www.genome.gov/10004765)
DNA: Deoxyribonucleic acid (see Nucleic acids) is known as the molecule of life.
Drug Discovery: The process involved in discovering new drugs.
Embryonic Stem Cells: Primitive (undifferentiated) cells derived from a 5-day preimplantation embryo that have the potential to become a wide variety of specialized cell types (http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/glossary.asp)
Embryonic Stem Cell Line: Embryonic stem cells, which have been cultured under in vitro conditions that allow proliferation without differentiation for months to years (http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/glossary.asp)
Gene: A specific sequence of nucleotides in DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) or RNA (Ribo-nucleic acid). There are 26,261 genes distributed along the 23 pairs of chromosomes in humans. Each gene contains a particular set of information coding for a particular protein in a cell.
Genome: The sum total of an organism’s genetic material.
Nucleic Acids: There are approximately 3 billion DNA sub units or chemical base pairs, called nucleic acids in the human genome, denoted by the letters A, T, G, and C. Each pair of nucleic acid is called a base pair. These are like rungs on a spiralling staircase.
Pharmacogenomics: Field that uses information about an individual’s genetic makeup to maximize the efficacy of treatments, while at the same time minimizing the unwanted side effects (Krane & Raymer, 2003).
RNA: Ribonucleic acid (see Nucleic acids).
Somatic Stem Cells: Non-embryonic stem cells that are not derived from gametes (egg or sperm cells) (http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/glos-sary.asp)
Stem Cells: Cells with the ability to divide for indefinite periods in culture and to give rise to specialized cells (http://stemcells.nih.gov/info/glossary.asp).
