Bioinformatics Research Guide: GenBank

GenBank ^® is the NIH genetic sequence database, an annotated collection of all publicly available DNA sequences (Nucleic Acids Research, 2013 Jan;41(D1):D36-42). GenBank is part of the International Nucleotide Sequence Database Collaboration, which comprises the DNA DataBank of Japan (DDBJ), the European Nucleotide Archive (ENA), and GenBank at NCBI. These three organizations exchange data on a daily basis.

A GenBank release occurs every two months and is available from the ftp site. The release notes for the current version of GenBank provide detailed information about the release and notifications of upcoming changes to GenBank. Release notes for previous GenBank releases are also available. GenBank growth statistics for both the traditional GenBank divisions and the WGS division are available from each release. GenBank growth statistics for both the traditional GenBank divisions and the WGS division are available from each release.

An annotated sample GenBank record for a Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene demonstrates many of the features of the GenBank flat file format.

Access to GenBank

• Find bioassays in which a given drug is active
• Find bioassays that test a particular disease or protein target
• Save text searches and set up automated searches with E-mailed results
• Submit data to NCBI
• Download NCBI Software
• Submit sequence data to NCBI
• Retrieve all sequences for an organism or taxon
• Find the function of a gene or gene product
• Find expression patterns
• Find genes associated with a phenotype or disease
• Find human variations associated with a phenotype or disease (clinical association)
• Display genomic annotation graphically