Final answer:
Bioinformatics is an interdisciplinary field that uses computer science to manage and analyze biological data, including DNA sequence comparison. It utilizes databases and computational tools to reveal evolutionary relationships and aid in gene expression analysis, greatly advancing biological research and systematics.
Step-by-step explanation:
The use of computer science to analyze biological data, such as DNA sequence comparison data, is known as bioinformatics. This interdisciplinary field merges biology, computer science, and information technology to manage and analyze biological data. With the emergence of bioinformatics, scientists are now able to perform detailed sequence comparisons to understand the function of macromolecules by comparing new sequences to those with known functions.
Advanced computational tools and databases, like GenBank, are utilized to align and analyze DNA and RNA sequences. These analyses can establish sequence homology, shedding light on evolutionary relationships and the construction of phylogenetic trees. Moreover, bioinformatics is instrumental in microarray analysis, where gene expression patterns among different cell types can be compared, which is crucial in medical research for diseases like cancer.
In addition to sequence alignment, bioinformatics employs a variety of computer algorithms and statistical analyses to interpret vast amounts of data. This has revolutionized areas such as molecular systematics and taxonomy, and brought about a new approach to in silico research—opening the door to advances in both biological understanding and technology, thus creating promising career opportunities in the field.