We are on the cusp of an explosion of biological data generated by the human genome project and sequencing projects in multiple organisms, coupled with advances in both experimental and information technologies. All this is contributing to a new era of personalized medicine, using a deeper understanding of our bodies and their diseases at the molecular level. The huge demand to manage, analyze, and interpret these various data has led to the growing stature of the field of information science that is called bioinformatics.

Bioinformatics encompasses all aspects of biological information—acquisition, processing, storage, distribution, analysis, and interpretation—and combines the tools and techniques of mathematics, computer science, and biology with the aim of furthering the understanding of diseases. The National Institutes of Health defines bioinformatics as “research, ...