This is the website of the Bioinformatics and Molecular Evolution Unit of NUI Maynooth. We work in the area of comparative biology, mostly from the perspective of computational analysis of genes, proteins, genomes and their interactions. We work on the evolution of animals, plants, fungi, prokaryotes and viruses.
NUI Maynooth has a variety of computational platforms that we use – a 344-core linux cluster, a 128 Gb RAM 16-core SMP computer for large-memory computation and a variety of smaller computers. In addition, we use the facilities of the Irish Centre for High-End Computing.
Our research unit is located in the Callan building in a newly-built facility, designed for bioinformatics. Feel free to browse through our publications, research interests and updates on what we are doing. You can click on the icons below to share this website on the various social media. You can subscribe to our blog posts here: 
- Erwin, D.H., Laflamme, M., Tweedt, S.M., Sperling, E.A., Pisani, D. and Peterson, K.J. (2011) The Cambrian Conundrum: Early Divergence and Later Ecological Success in the Early History of Animals. Science Vol. 334 (6059) pp. 1091-1097. DOI: 10.1126/science.1206375 [link]
- Campbell, L.I., Rota-Stabelli, O., Edgecombe, G.D., Marchioro, T., Longhorn, S.J., Telford, M.J., Philippe, H., Rebecchi, L., Peterson, K.J., and Pisani D. (2011) MicroRNAs and phylogenomics resolve the relationships of Tardigrada and suggest that velvet worms are the sister group of Arthropoda. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1105499108 [link].
- Cotton, J.A., and McInerney, J.O. (2010) Eukaryotic genes of archaebacterial origin are more important than the more numerous eubacterial genes, irrespective of function. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 107:40 17252-17255. [link]
- Butler G, Rasmussen MD, Lin MF, Santos MA, Sakthikumar S, Munro CA, Rheinbay E, Grabherr M, Forche A, Reedy JL, Agrafioti I, Arnaud MB, Bates S, Brown AJ, Brunke S, Costanzo MC, Fitzpatrick DA, de Groot PW, Harris D, Hoyer LL, Hube B, Klis FM, Kodira C, Lennard N, Logue ME, Martin R, Neiman AM, Nikolaou E, Quail MA, Quinn J, Santos MC, Schmitzberger FF, Sherlock G, Shah P, Silverstein KA, Skrzypek MS, Soll D, Staggs R, Stansfield I, Stumpf MP, Sudbery PE, Srikantha T, Zeng Q, Berman J, Berriman M, Heitman J, Gow NA, Lorenz MC, Birren BW, Kellis M, Cuomo CA. (2009) Evolution of pathogenicity and sexual reproduction in eight Candida genomes. Nature. 459(7247):657-662. [link]
- McInerney, J.O., Cotton, J.A. and Pisani, D. (2008) The Prokaryotic Tree of Life: Past, Present…and Future? Trends in Ecology and Evolution 23 (5) 276-281. [link]
- McInerney, J.O. and Pisani, D (2007) Genetics: Paradigm for Life. Science 318:1390-1391. [link]
- Kinsella, R.J., Fitzpatrick, D.A., Creevey, C.J. and McInerney J.O. (2003). Fatty acid biosynthesis in Mycobacterium tuberculosis: Lateral gene transfer, adaptive evolution and gene duplication. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, 100, 10320-10325. [link]
- McInerney, J.O. (1998). Replicational and Transcriptional Selection on Codon Usage in Borrelia burgdorferi. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA: 95 10698-10703. [link]
Our research unit is generously funded by Science Foundation Ireland and departmental funding. We are also supported by the Irish Centre for High-End Computing.
James Mcinerney
James McInerney's research is focussed on genome evolution, horizontal gene transfer, gene duplication and loss. Learn More»
Davide Pisani
Davide Pisani works on arthropod phylogenomics and other phylogenomic problems. Learn More»
David Fitzpatrick works on the evolution of fungi and their genomes. 