Microarray analysis - a complex technology commonly used in many applications such as discovering genes, disease diagnosis, drug development and toxicological research - has just become easier and more user-friendly. A new advanced software program called Eureka-DMA provides a cost-free, graphical interface that allows bioinformaticians and bench-biologists alike to initiate analyses, and to investigate the data produced by microarrays. The program was developed by Ph.D. student Sagi Abelson of the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel.

Bioengineers from the University of California, San Diego have created a new method for analyzing RNA transcripts from samples of 50 to 100 cells. The approach could be used to develop inexpensive and rapid methods for diagnosing cancers at early stages, as well as better tools for forensics, drug discovery and developmental biology.

Joel Dudley, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences and Director of Biomedical Informatics at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, talks to contributing editor Tanuja Koppal, Ph.D. about the current changes impacting bioinformatics.

ImageJS is a free app system in some ways like Angry Birds that analyzes tissue images instead of offering a digital shooting gallery