-omics
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Informally, the English-language neologism omics refers to a field of study in biology ending in the suffix -omics such as genomics or proteomics. The related neologism omes addresses the objects of study of such fields, such as the genome or proteome respectively. The suffix “-om-” is frequently taken to refer to totality of some sort.
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Origin
The suffix “-om-” is a back-formation from “genome”, a word formed in analogy with “chromosome”.<ref name="omic_dict">Coleridge, H.; et alii. The Oxford English Dictionary</ref> The word “chromosome” is of course formed from the Greek “χρωμ(ατ)-” and “σωμ(ατ)-” (body).<ref name="omic_dict" /> (Because “genome” refers to the complete genetic makeup of an organism, an inference has been made by some that there must be some root, “-ome-” of Greek origin referring to wholeness or to completion, but any such root would be unknown to all or most scholars of Greek.<ref name="liddell">Liddell,, H.G.; Scott, R.; et alii. A Greek-English Lexicon [1996]. (Search at Perseus Project.)</ref>)
Because of the success of large-scale quantitative biology projects such as genome sequencing, the suffix "-om-" has migrated to a host of other contexts. Bioinformaticians and molecular biologists figured amongst the first scientists to start to apply the "-ome" suffix widely.
References
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Usefulness and acceptance
The "omes" may provide a useful way for computational biologists to encapsulate a particular class of cellular processes, or computing-related mechanisms. However, only "ome" other than "genome" has shaken off its origin as a buzzword: proteome, the totality of proteins (translated expressed genes) in an organism, tissue type or cell. "Proteomics" has now become well-established as a term for studying the proteome.
Researchers have proposed other less well-established "omes" which have not won universal acceptance within genomics or biology as a whole. The feasibility of a systematic enumeration of entities like these seems far less clear (unlike in the case of genomics or even proteomics), and such enumeration may not help in providing biological insight.
Some of the new "omes"
- The transcriptome, the mRNA complement of an entire organism, tissue type, or cell; with its associated field transcriptomics[1]
- The metabolome, the totality of metabolites in an organism; with its associated field metabolomics[2]
- The metallome, the totality of metal and metalloid species; with its associated field metallomics
- The lipidome, the totality of lipids; with its associated field Lipidomics [3]
- The interactome, the totality of the molecular interactions in an organism[4]; a once proposed field of interactomics[5] has generally become known as systems biology
- The spliceome (see spliceosome), the totality of the alternative splicing protein isoforms;[6] with its associated field spliceomics.
- The ORFeome refers to the totality of DNA sequences that begin with the initiation codon ATG, end with a nonsense codon, and contain no stop codon. Such sequences may therefore encode part or all of a protein.[7][8]
Speculative "omics" and "omes"
- Textome: The body of scientific literature which text mining can analyse. Textomics: The study of the textome.
- Kinome: The totality of protein kinases in a cell. Kinomics: The study of the kinome. Publications exist.
- Glycosilome: Related to glycosylation. Glycosilomics: The associated field of study.
- Physiome: Related to physiology. Physiomics: The associated field of study.
- Neurome: The complete neural makeup of an organism. A word which a neurobiologist might utter in the future. Neuromics: The study of the neurome
- Predictome: A complete set of predictions.[9]
- Reactome: A knowledge base of biological processes.[10]
Unrelated words in -omics
Note that “comic” does not exemplify this suffix; it derives from “κωμ(ο)-” (merriment) + “-ικ(ο)-” (an adjectival suffix), rather than presenting a truncation of “σωμ(ατ)-”.
Similarly, the word “economy” is assembled from “οικ(ο)-” (household) + “νομ(ο)-” (law or custom), and “economic(s)” from “οικ(ο)-” + “νομ(ο)-” + “-ικ(ο)-”.
See also
External links
- OMICS: A Journal of Integrative Biology
- List of omics — Lists far more than this page, with references/origins. Maintained by the Cambridge Health Institute.
- Omics World – Resources and information for omics research
- Omics.org — The -omics wiki.ja:オーミクス