Abstract

Various technologies can be used to produce genome-scale, or 'omics', data sets that provide systems-level measurements for virtually all types of cellular components in a model organism. These data yield unprecedented views of the cellular inner workings. However, this abundance of information also presents many hurdles, the main one being the extraction of discernable biological meaning from multiple omics data sets. Nevertheless, researchers are rising to the challenge by using omics data integration to address fundamental biological questions that would increase our understanding of systems as a whole.

Author affiliations

1. Bioinformatics Program, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, California 92093-0412, USA. Email: ajoyce@ucsd.edu
2. Department of Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, California 92093-0412, USA. Email: palsson@ucsd.edu