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An introduction to information retrieval: applications in genomics

The Pharmacogenomics Journal volume 2, pages 96–102 (2002)Cite this article

Abstract

Information retrieval (IR) is the field of computer science that deals with the processing of documents containing free text, so that they can be rapidly retrieved based on keywords specified in a user's query. IR technology is the basis of Web-based search engines, and plays a vital role in biomedical research, because it is the foundation of software that supports literature search. Documents can be indexed by both the words they contain, as well as the concepts that can be matched to domain-specific thesauri; concept matching, however, poses several practical difficulties that make it unsuitable for use by itself. This article provides an introduction to IR and summarizes various applications of IR and related technologies to genomics.

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Acknowledgements

The author thanks Cynthia Brandt, MD, and John Fisk, MD, of the Yale Center for Medical Informatics, and the anonymous reviewers for feedback on the article. The author is supported by grants U01 ES10867–02 from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, R01 LM06843–02 from the National Library of Medicine and U01 CA78266–04 from the National Cancer Institute.

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  1. Center for Medical Informatics, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA

    P M Nadkarni

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  1. P M Nadkarni
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Correspondence to P M Nadkarni.

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Nadkarni, P. An introduction to information retrieval: applications in genomics. Pharmacogenomics J 2, 96–102 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.tpj.6500084

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