Expasy

Expasy is an online bioinformatics resource operated by the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics. It is an extensible and integrative portal which provides access to over 160 databases and software tools and supports a range of life science and clinical research areas, from genomics, proteomics and structural biology, to evolution and phylogeny, systems biology and medical chemistry. The individual resources (databases, web-based and downloadable software tools) are hosted in a decentralized way by different groups of the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics and partner institutions.

Logo Expasy 2020

Search engine

Queries of Expasy allow:

1. parallel searches SIB databases through a single search
2. aggregated search results from the complete set of >160 resources accessible from the portal.^[1]

Expasy provides up-to-date information from the most recent release of each resources.

The terms used in Expasy are based on the EDAM comprehensive ontology.^[2]

History

Expasy was created in August 1993. Originally, it was called ExPASy (Expert Protein Analysis System) and acted as a proteomics server to analyze protein sequences and structures and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-D Page electrophoresis).^[3] Among others, ExPASy hosted the protein sequence knowledge base, UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot, and its computer annotated supplement, UniProtKB/TrEMBL.^[4]

ExPASy was the first website of the life sciences and among the first 150 websites in the world. As of 5 April 2007^[update], ExPASy had been consulted 1 billion times since its installation on 1 August 1993.^[5]

In June 2011, it became the SIB ExPASy Bioinformatics Resources Portal: a diverse catalogue of bioinformatics resources developed by SIB Groups.^[6] The current version of Expasy was released in October 2020.^[7][8]

Notes and references

1. "SIB Resources". sib.swiss. Retrieved 27 October 2020.
2. Ison J, Kalas M, Jonassen I, Bolser D, Uludag M, McWilliam H, et al. (May 2013). "EDAM: an ontology of bioinformatics operations, types of data and identifiers, topics and formats". Bioinformatics. 29 (10): 1325–32. doi:10.1093/bioinformatics/btt113. PMC 3654706. PMID 23479348.
3. Gasteiger E, Gattiker A, Hoogland C, Ivanyi I, Appel RD, Bairoch A (July 2003). "ExPASy: The proteomics server for in-depth protein knowledge and analysis". Nucleic Acids Research. 31 (13): 3784–8. doi:10.1093/nar/gkg563. PMC 168970. PMID 12824418.
4. "UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot - SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics | Expasy". www.expasy.org. Retrieved 15 March 2024.
5. ExPASy: SIB Bioinformatics Resource Portal
6. Artimo P, Jonnalagedda M, Arnold K, Baratin D, Csardi G, de Castro E, et al. (July 2012). "ExPASy: SIB bioinformatics resource portal". Nucleic Acids Research. 40 (Web Server issue): W597-603. doi:10.1093/nar/gks400. PMC 3394269. PMID 22661580.
7. Duvaud, Séverine; Gabella, Chiara; Lisacek, Frédérique; Stockinger, Heinz; Ioannidis, Vassilios; Durinx, Christine (13 April 2021). "Expasy, the Swiss Bioinformatics Resource Portal, as designed by its users". Nucleic Acids Research. 49 (W1): W216–W227. doi:10.1093/nar/gkab225. ISSN 0305-1048. PMC 8265094. PMID 33849055.
8. "Discover the new Expasy.org, the Swiss Bioinformatics Resource Portal". sib.swiss. Retrieved 26 October 2020.

External links

• Official website