= C. Robin Buell
{c}
C. Robin Buell is a researcher in <genomics> and <bioinformatics>, including the <genome> biology of plants and plant-associated organisms. Her institutional research description emphasizes <comparative genomics> and the provision of databases and computational tools for interpreting <genomes>.<C. Robin Buell research profile at the University of Georgia>[Named faculty profile, research description]{ref}
Buell was first author of the 2003 complete <genome> sequence report for <Pseudomonas syringae> pathovar tomato DC3000. The publication described approximately $6.5$ million <base pairs>, distributed across one circular <chromosome> and two <plasmids>, with $5763$ predicted <open reading frames>. These are the study's reported assembly and annotation results, rather than an assertion that later annotations must retain exactly the same counts.<The complete genome sequence of the Arabidopsis and tomato pathogen Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato DC3000 by C. Robin Buell and others>[PNAS 100, 10181–10186 (2003), Abstract]{ref}
An illuminating distinction is the difference between a sequence measurement and its interpretation. <DNA sequencing> supplies evidence for the order of <nucleotides>; <genome annotation> identifies candidate features and proposes their biological roles. An <open reading frame> is therefore not, by itself, a demonstration that a particular <protein> is expressed or has a proposed function. Independent evidence can test those additional claims.
The published scale also gives a useful arithmetic check. Dividing the approximate genome size by its predicted <open reading frame> count gives
$$
\frac{6.5\times10^6}{5763}\approx1128
$$
<base pairs> of total <genome> sequence per predicted <open reading frame>. This is a bookkeeping ratio, not a mean coding-sequence length: its numerator includes noncoding sequence, and the annotation may contain overlapping features. Confusing these quantities would turn a reasonable summary of <genome> density into an incorrect claim about individual <genes>. This example shows why the definitions of both numerator and denominator matter when interpreting large biological datasets.
\Image[https://secure.caes.uga.edu/personnel/photos/2022_CarolBuell2.jpg]
{title=C. Robin Buell}
{description=Portrait explicitly identified in the University of Georgia faculty profile.}
{height=300}
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