The Ribosomal Database Project: Automation, Integration and Education

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Our view of the evolutionary relationships among life forms on Earth was revolutionized by the comparative analysis of ribosomal RNA sequences. Life is now viewed as belonging to one of three primary lines of evolutionary descent: the Archaea, Bacteria or Eucarya. This shift in paradigm has not only challenged dour understanding of life's origin, but also provided an intellectual framework for studying extant life - particularly the vast diversity of microorganisms. The repository of rRNA sequences that has permitted major advances in biology form the core of the Ribosomal Database Project (RDP). RDP is a value added database available to the research community through the RDP website. The RDP organized raw sequences into alignments, annotates rRNA sequence data, provides a phylogenetic overview of life and offers a suite of services and tools to assist in the handling and analysis of the data. These RDP products are widely used in molecular phylogeny and evolutionary biology, microbial ecology, bacterial identification, characterizing microbial populations, and in understanding the diversity of life.The RDP will provide 1. Automation of sequence harvesting, alignment and annotation procedures to allow the RDP to provide high-quality up-to-date data 2. Provision of new and enhanced phylogeny and ecology tools, along with an upgraded website, to allow our users to make use of these date and to analyze their own data. And 3. Provision of training, education, and support to the user community and assistance in the dissemination 'best practices' for the use of rRNA data in phylogenetic and ecological studies. Recent breakthroughs in secondary-structure aware rRNA autoaligners have made these goals achievable.