Genome sequencing and informatics: new tools for biochemical discoveries.

During the past 3 years, we have experienced a major revolution in the biological sciences resulting from a tremendous flux of information generated by genomesequencing efforts. Our understanding of microorganisms, the metabolic processes they catalyze, the genetic apparatuses encoding cellular proteinaceous constituents, and the pathological conditions caused by these organisms has greatly benefited from the availability of complete microbial genomic sequences. Many research institutes around the world are now devoting their efforts solely to genome sequencing and to analysis of the data produced. Dozens of international conferences have been held with the primary purpose of keeping the scientific community abreast of recent developments. In this Update I will summarize some of the exciting information reported at a recent conference on microbial genomics. Compared with microbe genomics, plant genomics is still in its infancy, since the sequencing of only the Arabidopsis genome is currently under way (Bevan et al., 1998). However, within a few years we can expect that the genomic sequences of at least two plants, Arabidopsis and rice (Oryza sativa), will be available. Meanwhile, as of January 1998, 12 microbial genomes have already been sequenced and published. These include genomes of representative organisms from the three domains of life: bacteria, archaea, and eukarya. The genomes of one eukaryote (the brewers’ yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae) as well as three archaea and eight bacteria have been completely sequenced. By examining what has been learned from sequencing of microbial genomes, we can get some idea about what kinds of information we can expect from plant genome-sequencing efforts.