CiteXplore

What is it with software and websites and scientific tools that they all have to have these mixed case acronyms, abbreviations, and odd spelling?

Anyway, today sees the launch of another odd spelling from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute – CiteXplore. This is a freely accessible literature resource service that melds data from the peer-reviewed scientific literature with key biological data such as DNA and protein sequences, functions and structures of molecules and microarray data.

The tool essentially searches Medline abstracts, patent abstracts, and Chinese Biological Abstracts and links to publisher websites. But, the crucial difference between this and any other literature search tool is that it cross-links to EMBL-EBI’s biological databases.

‘When you are reading an abstract describing a specific gene or protein, typically you want more information on it, for example its sequence or its function, as well as easy access to the full paper,’ says Peter Stoehr, who coordinates CiteXplore. Built-in text-mining tools allow “touch of a button” or more aptly, “click-of-a-(lab)-mouse” access to the specific record for a molecule of interest.

This is just the kind of system that chemists Peter Murray-Rust and Henry Rzepa have been aiming for the chemical sciences. Once again, the bio guys seem to have stolen a march on chemistry.