We announce the formation of an International Mammalian Genome Society to promote and coordinate the experimental genetic study of mammals, including comparative mapping, gene regulation, and molecular genetics. The major purpose of the society will be to provide a more formal mechanism of communication for investigators interested in mammalian genetics and an opportunity for open forums addressing issues that arise from the rapidly expanding amount of information in the field. This society will be open to all investigators for whom mammalian genetics is a central focus, or who use the mouse or other mammals as model systems for studying areas of human biology.
The society has three goals. The first is to facilitate the development and maintenance of genetic information databases. The second is to organize meetings that will bring together, collate, integrate, and assess genetic information, construct maps that best represent available information about the organization and structure of mammalian genomes, and disseminate that information rapidly and widely. In this way, the society will help to enhance opportunities for genetic analysis in mammalian model systems and make existing genetic information a more effective and useful tool for non-geneticists. The third goal is to coordinate this development with the comparable efforts now underway for mapping and sequencing the human genome. This focus will underscore the value of model mammalian systems for understanding complex genome organization, and it will expand comparative mapping opportunities for genetic and molecular analyses of complex traits. Close association with a journal of mammalian genetics, Mammalian Genome, will play a major part in achieving these goals.