Summary: We have developed a web tool to predict Gene Ontology (GO) terms. The tool accepts an input DNA or protein sequence, and uses BLAST to identify homologous sequences in GO annotated databases. A graph is returned to the user via email. Availability: The tool is freely available at: http://udgenome.ags.udel.edu/frm_go.html/

The explosive growth in genomic (and soon, expression and proteomic) data, exemplified by the Human Genome Project, is a fertile domain for the application of multi-agent information gathering technologies. Furthermore, hundreds of smaller-profile, yet still economically important organisms are being studied that require the efficient and inexpensive automated analysis tools that multi-agent approaches can provide. In this paper, we discuss the use of DECAF, a multi-agent system toolkit based on RETSINA and TAEMS, to build reusable information gathering systems for bioinformatics. We will cover why bioinformatics is a classic application for information gathering, how DECAF supports it, and several extensions that support new analysis paths for genomic information.

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