Perl is preferred in bioinformatics because of its powerful string manipulation capabilities, which are crucial for handling nucleotide sequences and other biological strings. Additionally, Perl's comprehensive library of modules, such as BioPerl, provides researchers with pre-built functions for common bioinformatics tasks, such as sequence alignment, motif searching, and data visualization. This modularity and ease of use make Perl an attractive choice for researchers who need to quickly develop robust solutions.