on identifying recognition sites of B-cells and T-cells for allergens. The three-dimensional structural properties of allergens control their allergenicity. The use of immunoinformatics tools can be useful to predict protein allergenicity and will become increasingly important in the screening of novel foods before their wide-scale release for human use. Thus, there are major efforts under way to make reliable broad based allergy databases and combine these with well validated prediction tools in order to enable the identification of potential allergens in genetically modified drugs and foods. Though the developments are on primary stage, the World Health organization and Food and Agriculture Organization have proposed guidelines for evaluating allergenicity of genetically modified foods. According to the Codex alimentarius, a protein is potentially allergenic if it possesses an identity of ≥6 contiguous amino acids or ≥35% sequence similarity over an 80 amino acid window with a known allergen. Though there are rules, their inherent limitations have started to become apparent and exceptions to the rules have been well reported Infectious diseases and host responses In the study of infectious diseases and host responses, the mathematical and computer models are a great help. These models were very useful in characterizing the behavior and spread of infectious disease, by understanding the dynamics of the pathogen in the host and the mechanisms of host factors which aid pathogen persistence. Examples include Plasmodium falciparum and nematode infection in ruminants. Much has been done in understanding immune responses to various pathogens by integrating genomics and proteomics with bioinformatics strategies. Many exciting developments in large-scale screening of pathogens are currently taking place. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has initiated an endeavor for systematic mapping of B and T cell epitopes of category A-C pathogens. These pathogens include Bacillus anthracis (anthrax), Clostridium botulinum toxin (botulism), Variola major (smallpox), Francisella tularensis (tularemia), viral hemorrhagic fevers, Burkholderia pseudomallei, Staphylococcus enterotoxin B, yellow fever, influenza, rabies, Chikungunya virus etc. Rule-based systems have been reported for the automated extraction and curation of influenza A records. This development would lead to the development of an algorithm which would help to identify the conserved regions of pathogen sequences and in turn would be useful for vaccine development. This would be helpful in limiting the spread of infectious disease. Examples include a method for identification of vaccine targets from protein regions of conserved HLA binding and computational assessment of cross-reactivity of broadly neutralizing