Right in the middle of Kuala Lumpur's shopping hotspot of MidValley Megamall and the Gardens, amid the myriad of clothing, shoes, electronics and designer items, a subtle revolution of a different kind is occurring. Amid the hustle and bustle of the white collar offices of Bandar MidValley , lies the office of Malaysian Genomics Resource Centre (MGRC). Quite unlike your typical office areas, MGRC's office hosts several servers which provide researchers world-wide with easy access to high-speed sequence analysis tools while also serving the needs of individual scientists. MGRC is a subsidiary of Malaysian bioinformatics pioneer, Synamatix Sdn Bhd,( www.synamatix.com)

Helming the operational aspects of the Bio-Nexus status company is General Manager, Dr. Arif Anwar , who is passionately involved in bioinformatics and strongly believes in the need for bioinformatics for the development of the country.

“Basically, a key aim of MGRC is evangelizing the benefits of bioinformatics and genomics,” stresses Dr. Arif. “For biotechnology to be developed enough to contribute to our GDP, multiple components need to be in place. We already have excellent research infrastructure, policies and governance in place. A decade ago bioinformatics used to be a niche discipline, now it is systemically applied in all branches of life-science research and is critical for a successful biotechnology industry.”

MGRC provides three major service areas, mainly providing online bioinformatics tools, customized services, as well as training and support. Through its website MGRC is able to provide researchers with various genome, proteome and transcriptome databases as well as tools to undergo sequence analyses on the information provided. The database is provided through their signature SynaBASE platform, which not only allows faster and more efficient data processing, but is also able to provide unique content due to the advanced computational techniques employed.

Speaking on the differences of the MGRC bioinformatics platform and traditional research methods, Dr. Arif acknowledges that the current computational platform being utilized gives users an edge over other current database analyses, as the SynaBASE platform provides users with greater sensitivity, user-friendliness, faster performance, novel results, allowing a better work flow. BLAST type sequence searching which may take minutes to hours may only take a matter of milliseconds using this system.

In terms of customized services, MGRC has been in collaboration with various institutions on specific projects, including the prestigious Washington University Genome Sequencing Center (WUGSC), which played a major role in the Human Genome Project. MGRC also provides training in its drive for better bioinformatics knowledge in the country, and has been providing various bioinformatics workshops across the country for free. In line with their drive for better knowledge dissemination, as well as highlighting their wide links in the field, MGRC has embarked on an Eminent Speaker Series featuring talks by scientists involved in cutting-edge research in their respective fields. It is to this respect that prominent scientist from WUGSC, Dr Elaine Mardis has been invited to give a talk entitled, “Deciphering the Leukaemia Genome Using Next Generation Sequencing Technologies” on 25 th March 2008 in KL Convention Centre. Click here to register for the talk.

On future plans for the center, Dr. Arif mentions that the team is working to add more tools and functions to the site, as well as a significant upgrade to the current SynaSuite interface. “The industry is growing very rapidly. There would be more demands for such fundamental technologies from the industry's perspective. We hope to develop more people skilled in the use of bioinformatics as a solution for various research aspects as well as commercial uses,” concludes Dr. Arif.