Blueprint Adds Mandarin Translations to Biomolecular Database

(I-Newswire) May 22, 2005 - Freely available to academic, government, and commercial scientists worldwide, BIND offers data spanning molecular interactions between proteins, small molecules, and nucleic acids, as well as genetic interaction networks in a standardized format.

"The strong attendance at the 2004 HUPO World Congress in Beijing showed that the Asia-Pacific region (and China, in particular) is very much interested in becoming active partners in the international biomolecular community, which has largely focused on communicating in English," says Mr. Brian Yates, manager of Blueprint Asia.

"By offering key terms in BIND in Mandarin, however, we believe that Blueprint is making strides in meeting this community part way."

Blueprint introduced Mandarin language descriptions to a variety of interface functions throughout BIND, including the tool tips used to define the OntoGlyph images presented in BIND search windows. Scientists have only to draw their mouse cursor over the characters in the OntoGlyph Summary window to see in English and Mandarin what features the glyph defines.

The incorporation of Mandarin into the OntoGlyph descriptions is just the first of many such steps that Blueprint plans to take, as it continues to expand the utility of its databases and software tools.

"While attending the HUGO and HUPO shows last autumn, working with our colleagues at Blueprint-Asia in Singapore, I spent some time pouring through text books written in Mandarin," explains Dr. Christopher Hogue, Blueprint's principal investigator.

"I quickly came to realize that by focusing on the key scientific terms described in English, I could get a general understanding of what the book was describing without truly understanding any of the Chinese text."

"In the same way, I believe that adding a Mandarin description for key words in BIND and Blueprint's other tools will open our systems to a community that has only recently begun to show its scientific potential."

Notes:Users must download an appropriate language key to view the Mandarin characters.

About Blueprint Initiative Asia Pte Ltd.

The Blueprint Initiative Asia Pte. Ltd. (Blueprint Asia) is a non-profit company registered in Singapore and affiliated with The Blueprint Initiative, based at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute in Toronto's Mount Sinai Hospital. Blueprint established, operates, and maintains the public, freely accessible Biomolecular Interaction Network Database (BIND), which receives, organizes, and disseminates biomolecular data in a secure, reliable, standardized format. This will contribute to the integration of the world's biomolecular assembly knowledge and support a complete understanding of cellular biology though high-performance computing simulation. Blueprint Asia's focus will be on human diseases of interest to researchers in Asia, and to support biotechnology, bioinformatics, and human resources development in Singapore. Blueprint Asia is supported by cash and in-kind contributions from the Singapore Economic Development Board and Sun Microsystems. For more information about Blueprint Asia, visit www.blueprint.org. For more information contact: Randall C Willis Tel: 416-596-6266 e-Mail: rwillis@blueprint.org

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