Last month saw the launch of the new European Nucleotide Archive (ENA), which is developed and maintained by the European Molecular Biology Laboratory's European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL–EBI). Now Europe's largest database of DNA and RNA sequence information, the ENA is a 'one stop shop' for sequencing information, comprising both annotated sequences and raw data, and has 'evolved' to accommodate the ever-growing amount of data generated by fast and improved sequencing technologies.
The ENA is partly made up of sequences from the EMBL nucleotide sequence database (EMBL–Bank), which are annotated (for example, with the location of introns and exons in the sequence) and linked to other databases (for example, TREMBL and SwissProt). Importantly, the ENA now allows submission of and access to raw sequence data by incorporating two additional databases: the European Trace Archive (which contains data generated by electrophoresis machines and was previously maintained by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute) and the newly established Sequence Read Archive (SRA; which contains data generated by next-generation technologies). All sequences are validated following submission and then integrated into the database.
The ENA is a continuously improving effort, with plans to add new features over the next 12 months, such as making the browser interface more user-friendly and improving the submission tools. The aim is to promote “scientific progress by providing global access to nucleotide sequence information,” according to Graham Cameron, Associate Director of EMBL–EBI.
The ENA is freely available, so log in today to submit your sequencing data or browse sequences and related information generated by others.
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David, R. One stop shop. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol 11, 463 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrm2933
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrm2933
