The ambitious bio-informatics research project, which commenced as part of the New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative (NMTLI) of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is nearing a successful completion. The joint project, which involved the private sector software major, Tata Consultancy Service (TCS) is coming out with an innovative software package that can be used for advanced biotech research soon.

According to sources from CSIR, the major chunk of the work for the software package is being carried out by TCS with the support from 18 CSIR institutions that are into basic research in biotechnology.

The software package is to be ready for official launch in three months, NMTLI sources informed. They said that this integrated Indian software package for bioinformatics is going to be the first major success of the NMTLI programme. TCS is known to be planning a major pre-launch publicity within the country and abroad for the software in the coming months.

The software, which could possibly compete with leading international products such as those of Accelrys (formerly MSI) of Europe and TRIPOS of US, would be a versatile, portable and upgradable one, suitable to parallel processing and capable of offering solutions to the innate imperfections and rigours connected with existing customized packages.

The CSIR has chipped in Rs 15 crore for the project. Intellectual property arising out of the project is likely to be invested with the CSIR institutions. The rights would be shared with TCS also.

Among the CSIR institutions taking part in the project are Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore; Centre for Biochemical Technology (CBT), New Delhi; Centre for DNA Finger-printing & Diagnostics (CDFD), Hyderabad; Institute of Microbial Technology (IMT), Chandigarh; Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad; Bose Institute, Kolkata; Pune University, and Indian Institute of Technologies in Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai.

CSIR has already funded 18 projects under the NMTLI programme during the last two years. The bioinformatics project is likely to be the first one to be complete. The central government has earmarked Rs 50 crore as annual outlay for the NMTLI funding. While CSIR funded nine projects in the first year, Year 2002 saw the rest of the projects being cleared.

According to sources, the major funding for the current year has gone for research projects meant for scientifically proving the efficacy of certain herbal formulations used in the treatment of arthritis and diabetics. Quick clinical trials would be carried out on selected herbs, which are known to have therapeutic properties.