[Taxacom] DNA only descriptions

[bti at dsmz.de]

Quoting Richard Pyle
>
> However, I think the biodiversity "dark matter", representing the elephant
> in the room of undocumented biodiversity, are the microbial things
> (particularly the "unculturables") that really are much easier to discover
> and distinguish with the aid of DNA sequences (see Craig Venter's work on
> sequencing the oceans).
>

However, it also doesn't tell us what the organisms are doing with  
their genes. One still has the same problems with describing the  
organism. Good 50% of all genes in prokaryotes are inadequately  
annotated (including "hypothetical protein" and there is also a good  
percentage that are wrongly annotated.

Slightly off-track, but an interesting viewpoint is:
http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/365/1537/207.full
"Sequences and consequences" by Sydney Brenner

But I am sure you knew that I was going to say that.......

Brian


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