Computational Biology: Comparing Vertebrate Genomes

There are currently 17 vertebrate genomes, ranging from primates to fishes, for which we know nearly their entire DNA sequences, and this number will increase rapidly. Comparing these genome sequences has emerged as one of the most important areas of computational biology. One way to predict functional portions of the human genome, for example, is to search among related genomes for sequences that appear to be remarkably similar due to selective pressure. Martin Tompa discusses and demonstrates some of the methods and tools for such an approach, as well as some of the challenges and unsolved problems.