GenBank is the NIH genetic sequence database, a collection of all known DNA sequences. A five-page descriptionis available. There are approximately 286,000,000 bases and 352,400 sequences as of April 1995. As an example, you may view the record for the neurofibromatosis gene. The complete release notes for the current version of GenBank are available. A new release is made every two months.
Many journals require submission of sequence information to a database prior to publication so that an accession number may appear in the paper. NCBI has a WWW form, called BankIt, for convenient and quick submission of sequence data. There is also a stand-alone program for MACs and PCs, called Authorin, which is available free from NCBI. You can submit your sequence in an Authorin file by E-mail or by mailing a diskette. There are streamlined procedures available for batch submission of EST and STS sequences.
Revisions or updates to GenBank entries can be made at any time and can be accepted as Authorin files, on an electronic form, or as the text of an e-mail message. Be sure to give the accession number of the sequence to be updated. E-mail is preferred: update@ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
GenBank is available for searching via several methods.
NCBI is continuously developing new tools and enhancing existing ones to improve both submission and access to GenBank. The easiest way to keep posted of these and other developments is to read the NCBI News, which is also available by free subscription.