GLYCOVAULT: A WEB-BASED RESOURCE FOR GLYCAN PATHWAY VISUALIZATION, ANALYSIS AND MODELLING by SHRAVYA

VISUALIZATION, ANALYSIS AND MODELLING by SHRAVYA S. NIMMAGADDA (Under the Direction of John A. Miller) ABSTRACT Glycan biosynthesis is the process by which glycans are built in the cells. Information about the process is available from several Web accessible databases, published papers, experimental data produced at the Complex Carbohydrates Research Center (CCRC) as well as knowledge accumulated by the biologists working at CCRC. The principal purpose of GlycoVault is to support the research of glycobiologists in analyzing data about glycans, such as the changes in their abundance level over a cell's life cycle and their correlation with gene expression levels for proteins that serve as enzymes in the biosynthetic process. Traditional, bioinformatics resources have been provided by relational databases. Some new research efforts have proposed replacing relational databases with ontologies. In GlycoVault, we are utilizing both technologies to supply an integrated bioinformatics infrastructure that can serve as a resource to end users as well as other programs and applications.