BioTechniquesVol. 37, No. 4 WebWatchOpen AccessWebWatchKevin AhernKevin AhernSearch for more papers by this authorPublished Online:6 Jun 2018https://doi.org/10.2144/04374WW01AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail Weapons of HIV DestructionSpeaking of drugs, the number of Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved reagents for fighting human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) (20) may come as a surprise, but it pales in comparison with the tally of such compounds tested on HIV and opportunistic infections (over 115,000). At the National Institutes of Health (NIH)-hosted Anti-HIV and AIDS Therapeutics page, you'll discover that the number of classes alone of such drugs (21) exceeds the number of approved drugs, demonstrating either the rapid march of science or the slow pace of FDA approval (or both). Information on the numerous drugs is abundant—structures, ChemIDs, synonyms, supplier information, and more. For the FDA-approved anti-HIV drugs, add in vitro data to the cocktail, as well as interesting observations, such as this snippet—AZT-resistant strains of the virus can often be converted to AZT sensitivity by treatment with another FDA-approved drug, 3TC.http://www.niaid.nih.gov/daids/dtpdb/Neatly FoldedThat it takes more than a random arrangement of a polypeptide sequence of amino acids to create an active protein is something every scientist recognizes. What remains a puzzle, however, is the means by which these amino acid polymers fold into their functional form. Like the mystery reader who peeks at the last chapter of a mystery novel to discover the ending, so too can researchers see the end of the mystery of protein folding at the Enzyme Structures Database, by viewing the 3-D structures of over 13,000 enzymes. Organization is a strong point, with listings sorted by Enzyme Commission (EC) number. Search engines that retrieve information by EC name or by text entry provide excellent ways to locate desired structures.http://www.ebi.ac.uk/thornton-srv/databases/enzymes/Metabolic SoupMetabolic pathways do not operate in isolation, a fact that will be quickly apparent to anyone perusing Cold Spring Harbor's new Reactome site. Indeed, the most important message communicated at the site is that not only are biochemical pathways not independent of each other, but metabolism itself is an important component of seemingly unrelated cellular processes, such as information transmission and mitosis. Welcome to an ingeniously designed online outpost of systems biology where visitors can “drill down” to obtain details of metabolic pathways or zoom out to examine processes like translation, RNA processing, and the cell cycle. Hosted jointly by Cold Spring Harbor, the European Bioinformatics Institute, and the Gene Ontology Consortium, Reactome is a monumental achievement in presenting biological information.http://www.reactome.org/Affinity GroupBuilding a better mousetrap is an exercise in futility if the mice you're after won't come near it or can't fit in it. Designing pharmaceuticals is a bit like trying to catch mice. Researchers can study detailed structure databases of target proteins, receptors, and such to design their “bait,” but if the product they create to inhibit an enzyme won't bind it effectively, it probably won't make it past the initial screening phase. Just as the key to catching mice is optimizing the trap, the secret to designing better drugs is fine-tuning the affinity candidate molecules have for their proteins. Enter the Psychoactive Drug Screening Program (PDSP) Ki database with information on the affinity of over 26,000 potential psychoactive drugs for their target receptors available at the click of a button.http://kidb.cwru.edu/Mission ControlLike DaVinci's Vitruvian Man shown stretching out to the 24 human chromosomes on the opening page of the Human Chromosome Launchpad, visitors too can “reach out and touch” a lot of information at the well-designed Oak Ridge National Laboratories site. Cybernauts traveling here expecting only DNA sequences are in for a pleasant surprise. With an eye for hierarchy, the site's designers have organized an enormous amount of hyperlinked information about each chromosome into common categories, including Nomenclature, Genes/Markers/Disorders, Sequences, Maps, and others. This is a site worthy of recognition for easy retrieval of human DNA/protein information.http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/launchpad/FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Vol. 37, No. 4 Follow us on social media for the latest updates Metrics Downloaded 81 times History Published online 6 June 2018 Published in print October 2004 Information© 2004 Author(s)PDF download