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The art of biotechnology-DNA "expressionism": This image demonstrates the inherent flexibility of high-density oligonucleotide arrays produced by the maskless procedure described in the paper by Nuwaysir et al. To produce this image, van Gogh's The Starry Night was digitized and converted to a four-level gray-scale image. A distinct 18mer oligonucleotide probe corresponding to perfect match sequenceor one, two, or three mismatcheswas assigned to each of the four gray-scale values. Virtual masks were then designed using this information and an array was synthesized using the NimbleGen MAS technology. After synthesis, the array was hybridized with a single biotinylated oligonucleotide target corresponding to the perfect match sequence, stained with streptavidin-cy3, and the resulting hybridization data converted back to a color image. Like Impressionism, genomics (e.g., whole-genome gene expression data, i.e., "expressionism") asks the observer to absorb the entire molecular scene rather than focusing on one detail. Thus, like Impressionist art, genomics offers a radical change in the manner in which experimental biology is approached. (Vincent Van Gogh, The Starry Night, 1889, was used with permission of The Museum of Modern Art/licensed by Scala/Art Resource, NY. [For details, see Nuwaysir et al., pp. 1749-1755.])