Databases related to molecular biophysics 09-2022

A survey and comparative analysis of the technical provision of existing databases that provide for archival of data from molecular biophysics experiments and closely related areas has been carried out. The analysis demonstrates that for many methods provided by MOSBRI there is no specialist provision for data archival such as would adequately satisfy FAIR principles. In particular only a small number of databases containing molecular biophysics derived data use standard data formats with sufficiently rich metadata that enables interoperable data reuse. Where relevant molecular biophysics databases do exist, and in the closely related area of structural biology, there is a clear trend toward complete deposition of the experiment life cycle (i.e., primary experimental data, analysis procedure and interpretation), which will need to be incorporated into plans for the future MOSBRI data repository. The survey also highlights many resources that would have to be linked with any future MOSBRI data repository, to ensure findability and interoperability.