Computational approaches to understand the genome and protein sequences of fungi

Abstract

Fungi are large group of organism with tremendous diversity and economical importance. Application of bioinformatics approaches to understand the development and growth of organisms has a great scope. Bioinformatics is one of the rapidly emerging branches of science, which helps in understanding biological systems by using computer softwares and tools. The huge amount of data generated in life sciences on a daily basis from several projects is the major driving force for the growth and development of bioinformatics. Bioinformatics, also known as computational biology, is used to analyze genes, proteins, and genomes. Computational tools of genome, transcriptome, or exome analysis are very essential to make a meaning from this tremendous amount of data. In this chapter, I have described the bioinformatics approaches (databases and tools) that can be used in the better under-standing of the fungi genes, proteins, and genomes. I have also discussed about the implication of next-generation sequencing technology (NGS) tools on fungi genetics and genomes. Application of these tools and databases to understand the fungi genome and transcriptome will have tremendous effect on development, improvement, and sustainable cultivation of fungi.