Wormbase ParaSite

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Parasitic worms (helminths) cause a massive economic burden, with agricultural losses in the UK exceeding £100 million per annum. Across the globe helminths are also responsible for long term, chronic diseases in humans. The UK is a leader in research and development targeting helminths, despite global investment being disproportionately low compared with the impact of infections. Helminth are diverse - the term covers both round worms and flatworms - and no single model species can capture the range of disease-causing mechanisms involved. Researchers are therefore inherently interested in making comparisons between species. The genomes of more than 30 species are now published and many more available. Alongside their genomes, large scale functional genomics datasets have been produced describing key life cycle transitions for more than 10 species. To drive helminth research into the genomic era, we established WormBase ParaSite in 2014. The resource now contains more than 100 draft genomes of helminths. Genes and genomes can be explored, enabling a greater understanding of helminth biology to accelerate the development of new strategies for helminth control.In its first two years, there have been 8 public releases of the resource and in 2015 the website was accessed by 29000 unique users. In addition to accessing gene structures and functional annotation for draft genomes, users are able to examine evolutionary relationships between genes and look for the differences and similarities between species that may underpin differences and similarities in helminth biology. The resource provides fast and intuitive interfaces for browsing and searching and contains an interface for extracting custom datasets. Several workshops have been organised to provide training in its use.This proposal will fund the maintenance and improvement of WormBase ParaSite. We intend to incorporate all publicly available nematode and flatworm genome assemblies as they become available. Due to changes in sequencing technology, research groups will produce new and better versions of existing gene sequences. However, these sequences will in many cases not be annotated, so we will provide an automated way to annotate naked genomes with consistent gene structures and functional descriptions. Defining gene families will remain a critically important activity. However, we will increase the speed, accuracy and scalability in which evolutionary histories can be inferred. We will also greatly improve the way in which data from large-scale studies on gene expression or genome variation are included into the resource. In particular, a new Gene Expression Atlas will be included for interactive exploration of gene expression data. To help identify new drug targets or to identify re-use possibilities for existing drugs, WormBase ParaSite will include links to targets and chemistry data (by linking to the ChEMBL database). We will also enable users to query available phenotypic data.In addition to the new features, we will frequently update the site to provide rapid access to new data. We will continue to provide training on the use of the resource and maintain a live and responsive helpdesk.