Advanced Query Mechanisms for Biological Databases

Existing query interfaces for biological databases are either based on fixed forms or textual query languages. Users of a fixed form-based query interface are limited to performing some pre-defined queries providing a fixed view of the underlying database, while users of a free text query language-based interface have to understand the underlying data models, specific query languages and application schemas in order to formulate queries. Further, operations on application-specific complex data (e.g., DNA sequences, proteins), which are usually provided by a variety of software packages with their own format requirements and peculiarities, are not available as part of, nor integrated with biological query interfaces. In this paper, we describe generic tools that provide powerful and flexible support for interactively exploring biological databases in a uniform and consistent way, that is via common data models, formats, and notations, in the framework of the Object-Protocol Model (OPM)...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1998
• Where: ISMB
• Authors: I-Min A. Chen, Anthony Kosky, Victor M. Markowitz, Ernest Szeto, Thodoros Topaloglou
• Keywords: Computational Biology, ISMB 1998, Query Interfaces, Query Languages, Textual Query Languages