Recent advances in microbial databases with special reference to kinetoplastids

Advances in “Omics” and other technologies have resulted in the generation of enormous data of microorganisms. This wealth of knowledge requires comprehensive and robust analysis to study the nature of microbes in various environments and their interactions. Recent surge in prokaryotic and eukaryotic experimental data has led to an increase in number of databases. There are several prokaryotic microbial databases like NEMiD, BASE, MMP, fusionDB which are relevant to study their diversity and ecology. Microbial eukaryotes like kinetoplastids have gained attention due to their complex, undetermined, and intriguing interactions with the mammalian host. Kinetoplastids like Trypanosoma and Leishmania parasites responsible for the fatal human diseases like African sleeping sickness, Chagas disease, and Leishmaniasis have specialized databases like LeishCyc, TrypanoCyc, Leish-Exp, TritrypDB, etc. This chapter highlights some of the recent advances in the relevant microbial databases to study and comprehend the microbial diversity and ecology of prokaryotes and unicellular eukaryotes.