Excel-SBOL Converter: Creating SBOL from Excel Templates and Vice Versa

Abstract

Standards support synthetic biology research by enabling the exchange of component information. However, using formal representations, such as the Synthetic Biology Open Language (SBOL), typically requires either a thorough understanding of these standards or a suite of tools developed in concurrence with the ontologies. Since these tools may be a barrier for use by many practitioners, the Excel-SBOL Converter was developed to allow easier use of SBOL and integration into existing workflows. The converter consists of two Python libraries: one that converts Excel templates to SBOL, and another that converts SBOL to an Excel workbook. Both libraries can be used either directly or via a SynBioHub plugin. We illustrate the operation of the Excel-SBOL Converter with two case studies: uploading experimental data with the studys metadata linked to the measurements and downloading the Cello part repository. Graphical TOC Entry O_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=200 HEIGHT=111 SRC="FIGDIR/small/505873v1_ufig1.gif" ALT="Figure 1"> View larger version (15K): org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@c06d7aorg.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@153724eorg.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1758791org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@11779c2_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG C_FIG