Molecular Biology is a booming science with enormous scope and potential. In many ways its current status can be compared with the early days of the computer industry: it has the capacity to change the way we approach certain key technologies, such as medicine and manufacturing. It is now the time to develop new tools to deal with the vast amount of data which is available and with the inherent complexity of living organisms. Therefore, repositories, models and simulation tools are necessary. A first step towards discovery tools specific to life sciences is to represent  all the components of a living system in 3D. 

This 3D visualization tool enables to map cell components and to navigate within the cell at various scales from a complete cell down to a single macromolecule at atomic detail. It highlights space and physical constraints which are essential to understand life processes.

The Foundation Fourmentin-Guilbert initiated a first prototype to map molecular components of a bacterial cell E. coli. It deals with the representation of a volume (representing a part of the cell volume) and the integration of 3D reconstructions of biomolecules from various databases.

 

 The first release includes:

- 3D immersive navigation within a complete cell

- An dedicated environment to build 3D molecular assemblies

- A library of 3D objects

Future versions will bring:

- 3D reconstruction from heterogeneous data sources (e.g. PDB files, microscopy images) at different scales,

- Links to biological component and process databases

The LifeExplorer project is coordinated by the Fondation Fourmentin-Guibert

The LifeExplorer software is an open source project under GPL license. Current version uses 3D rendering from http://www.openscenegraph.org,  It runs on Windows XP and Vista and requires a 3D graphic card. If you are interested to participate in this project, contact us at info [at] lifeexplorer.eu