Bioinformatics should be blend of Eastern, Western methods

Bangalore, Sep 23 (UNI) The nascent bioinformatics education needs a fusion of Eastern kind of lateral thinking and Western rigour to take the subject to the heights of IT, Union Department of Science and Technology Secretary Dr T Ramasami said.

Delivering the convocation address at the Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied Biotechnology (IBAB) here yesterday, he said Bioinformatics has great future in the country, but developing core faculty would be vital.

He said the leather industry had proved how important bioinformatics is. It is now being increasingly used in treating leather, which had helped in bringing down the high pollution level caused by toxic chromium used earlier.

IISC Honorary professor and well known biotechnologist Prof M Vijayan said bioinformatics was a niche area, but the institutes teaching this subject are yet to get stabilised. It needs to be nurtured and sustained growth had to be ensured. Core support is needed both from private industry and the Government. Scholarship is the basic need of this field and a recurring offering of scholarship to talented students would go a long way in sustaining the research work that had just begun.

Institute Director Prof N Yathindra said the IBAB, which had its beginning five years ago, had emerged as a leading institution. Both Vision group on Biotechnology and the Department of IT and BT of the Karnataka Government had to be congratulated for setting up such a unique institution, perhaps the first public-private partnership in the area of life sciences in the country.

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