Marcelo Mendes Brandão1
1 Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, SP, Brazil
This article examines the fundamental importance of functional annotation in contemporary scientific research within the context of increasingly affordable molecular sequencing technologies and improved information accessibility. I explore how functional annotation serves as the critical bridge between raw sequence data and meaningful biological insights, driving progress across multiple scientific disciplines and applications. The integration of comprehensive functional annotation approaches is revealed as essential for maximizing the value of expand-ing molecular datasets and accelerating scientific discovery in the post-genomic era. In this context I present DeNSAS (De Novo Sequence Annotation System), a comprehensive, reference-free pipeline designed for functional annotation of transcripts, proteins, and genes in genome assemblies that lack reference annotation. Developed in-house, this automated system integrates multiple public databases and computational tools to provide accurate functional characterization of sequences without requiring a reference genome.