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Welcome to HGD

N. vitripennis. Picture by O. Niehuis.
Nasonia vitripennis. ©Oliver Niehuis

Project Information

With over 115,000 described species, the order Hymenoptera comprises approximately 10% of the species diversity on Earth. The largest described family in the order, Icheumonidae, contains more species than all species of birds and mammals combined! This group of 'membrane-winged' insects includes sawflies, bees, ants and wasps, which directly affect human health and agriculture through diverse roles such as pollinators, pests and parasitoids.

The Hymenoptera Genome Database (HGD) is an informatics resource supporting genomics of insect species of this order. HGD provides access to the genomes of bees Apis mellifera, Bombus terrestris and B. impatiens, the parasitoid wasp Nasonia vitripennis, and seven species of ants available through the Ant Genomes Portal. It will soon incorporate genome databases for two additional species of bees, Apis dorsata and A. florea, as well as two additional species of ants. Combining these species into a single resource allows biologists to leverage the genome information, and enhances the value of genomic data for each species by facilitating cross-species comparisons.

Data Usage Policy:
Genomes and predicted gene sets for the following species are not yet published: Bombus terrestris, B. impatiens, Apis florea, A. dorsata, and A. mellifera (latest assembly Amel_4.5).These sequences are provided to the public pre-publication to allow research on individual genes to proceed faster than the genome analysis would allow.  They are covered by the Ft. Lauderdale (1) and later Toronto (2) agreements whereby the data producers make the data available and state their intent to publish analyses, the data users ask permission to use the prepublication data and cite the appropriate source, and the journals and reviewers make sure that articles are published following the guidelines.  Release to GenBank and Ensembl and similar repositories does not constitute publication. Please contact us if you wish to use these sequences in published analyses.
 
References:
1. Sharing Data from Large-scale Biological Research Projects: A System of Tripartite Responsibility. Report of a meeting organised by the Wellcome Trust and held on 14-15 January 2003 at Fort Lauderdale, USA.
2. Toronto International Data Release Workshop Authors. Prepublication data sharing. Nature. 2009 Sep 10;461(7261):168-70.
 
How to Cite:
Please cite the use of this database as: Hymenoptera Genome Database: integrated community resources for insect species of the order Hymenoptera. Munoz-Torres MC, Reese JT, Childers CP, Bennett AK, Sundaram JP, Childs KL, Anzola JM, Milshina N, Elsik CG. Nucleic Acids Research (2011) 39(suppl 1): D658-D662 doi: 10.1093/nar/gkq1145

What's new in HGD?

  • Take a peek at our redesigned page for downloading assemblies and Official Gene Sets from the current and previous versions of the Apis mellifera genomes. Visit the new Data Sets Page on BeeBase..
  • "All versus All' protein alignments: Alignments of protein sets from all available species of Hymenoptera are now available at the Ant Genomes Portal. Visit individual genome pages and click on 'Data Sets' for more information.