Aviport: A Resource for Avian Biology

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The overall goal of this resource program is to develop AviPort, a comprehensive genomic, biological and computational analysis portal for avian researchers and the broader biomedical research community. Since the beginning of the modern era of experimental biology in the late 1800’s, birds have been the premier non-mammalian model organism. Technological advances over the past decade have led to increased use of avian organisms, and a dramatic expansion of genomic and biological information for avian species. Lacking an avian model organism database (MOD), avian resources have been developed ad hoc and are dispersed across numerous platforms. A mechanism to unify these resources is critically needed, along with resources and platforms for large-scale data analysis. Accordingly, this proposal will establish AviPort, a comprehensive resource for the avian and broader biomedical research communities. By combining the information integration functions of a classic MOD with a state of the art platform for data management and experimental analysis, AviPort will represent a unique new resource for biomedical research. The goals of this proposal will be accomplished through the following overall specific aims: 1) Incorporate several existing high-value avian genomic and biological resources into a single integrated resource, and leverage larger external resources to provide robust data management and analysis capabilities. 2) Provide high quality, curated data to support biomedical discovery. This will be accomplished by improving the genomes of chicken and other key avian species, developing reference sets for key avian species, standardizing nomenclature, providing functional annotation, and providing data curation to enable integration of avian data types. 3) Disseminate data, results and training resources to ensure that biomedical researchers are able to effectively translate data into discoveries.