Usage of the Sea Urchin Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus Database, HpBase.

HpBase ( http://cell-innovation.nig.ac.jp/Hpul/ ) is a database that provides genome and transcriptome resources of the sea urchin Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus. In addition to downloading the bulk data, several analysis tools for resource use are available: gene search, homology search, and genome browsing. HpBase also discloses the protocols for biological experiments using H. pulcherrimus that have been accumulated so far. Therefore, HpBase can assist efficient use of genome resources for researchers from various fields-evolutionary, developmental, and cell biology. In this chapter we present an overview and usage of tools in HpBase.