64 kbaud lines are presently connecting about 25 sites, as well as high speed lines to Paris and Amsterdam. National line performance and network density of this academic network are steadily growing. In the course of its life, BEN has already moved twice to more powerful computers. BEN offers its services to all Belgian molecular biology research groups, from academic to industrial institutions. Besides these group accounts, BEN offers individual accounts at strongly reduced rates.
Fees are slightly higher for industrial users than for their academic counterparts.
Services Until now, BEN has put emphasis on sequence analysis. The updating of these databanks is performed automatically with the help of UNIX shell scripts developed by Philippe. The xNDT service of Peter Gad is running in parallel. BEN is keeping two other Belgian Molecular Biology centres updated on a weekly basis with full databanks or selected records thereof. In order to keep in contact with its present users and to reach potential new users, BEN publishes a quarterly newsletter BEN News .