Big Data in Genomics: Challenges and Solutions

摘要

Every era has its technological breakthroughs. The widespread use of computers and the internet in the beginning of the 21st century has impacted the way we approach and search for information [1]. The emergence of social networks (examples include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others) and "cloud" solutions for data storage, with computer processor speed increasing at a fast pace has changed the way we generate information [1]. Success in biomedical research dealing with the increasing amounts of omics data combined with clinical information will depend on our ability to interpret high scale data sets that are generated by emerging technologies. Private companies such as Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon, Google, Facebook and Twitter are masters in dealing with petabyte scale data sets. Science and Medicine will need to implement the same type of scalable structure to deal with volumes of data generated by omics technologies. The life sciences will need to adapt to the advances in informatics to successfully address the Big Data problems that will be faced in the next decade.