GIS, bioinformatics collaborations offer promising new pe...( nterplay between geography and biology ...)

nterplay between geography and biology isnt entirely new. Software companies such as GIS giant ESRI and Jacquezs TerraSeer have for some time marketed software for health and natural resources applications. Representatives of both companies were in attendance, however, to survey some of academes first steps into a new area. They also shared perspectives from the marketplace on GISs future in bioinformatics and on applications of GIS to environmental epidemiology and ecology.

Shared technical challenges and applications relevant to both disciplines were other topics for discussion. Both fields rely heavily on mining, managing, accessing, and analyzing large amounts of data, and the disciplines share many of the same challenges for data management and representation, said Carol Bult of the University of Maine, who created the first direct application of GIS technology to bioinformatics and hosted the first spatial genomics workshop in 1997.

"We learned that many solutions to technical problems arrived at in one discipline can serve as object lessons for the other." Bult added that when some of the display and interactivity features of GIS maps are ported to genomics maps, genetic maps will go from being mere display tools to serving as interactive "mechanisms for discovery."

Campbell said other possible long-term outcomes of connecting the two investigative fields are better modeling of the spread of insect infestations, for instance that of the gypsy moth in the United States; better monitoring of diseases such as rabies in wildlife populations; improvements in agricultural productivity; and reductions in the negative environmental impacts of some agricultural activities. "The cross-pollination of research accomplished by the symposium," he said, "will accelerate multiple outcomes not even yet envisioned."

The seeds of collaboration have long been embedded in the lexicon and metaphors of both fields. Genomics participants language was ripe
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Contact: James B. Campbell Jr.
jayhawk@vt.edu
540-231-5841
Virginia Tech
28-Jun-2001

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