Genomics

The study of genes and their biological function is known as genomics. McKusick and Ruddle (1987), who also laid the foundation of genomics in the two complementary functions of genome mapping and sequencing, first popularised the term in the journal of the same name, where it was described as "born from a marriage of molecular and cell biology with classical genetics" and "fostered by computational science." They had no idea that genomics would become the model for a slew of related subdisciplines, each with the suffix 'omics' to indicate that they are dealing with the entire genome and/or all of its components, rather than just one gene or a small gene family. In any organism, genomics is concerned with alterations at the gene or DNA level. Through high-throughput technologies such as cDNA microarrays or quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction, it plays a key role in the study of stress physiology for understanding the mechanisms of toxicity.