Standardized schemas, databases, and public data repositories are needed for the studies of malaria vectors that encompass a remarkably diverse array of designs and rapidly generate large data volumes, often in resource-limited tropical settings lacking specialized software or informatics support. Data from the majority of mosquito studies conformed to a generic schema, with data collection forms recording the experimental design, sorting of collections, details of sample pooling or subdivision, and additional observations. Generically applicable forms with standardized attribute definitions enabled rigorous, consistent data and sample management with generic software and minimal expertise. Forms use now includes 20 experiments, 8 projects, and 15 users at 3 research and control institutes in 3 African countries, resulting in 11 peer-reviewed publications. We have designed generic data schema that can be used to develop paper or electronic based data collection forms depending on the availability of resources. We have developed paper-based data collection forms that can be used to collect data from majority of entomological studies across multiple study areas using standardized data formats. Data recorded on these forms with standardized formats can be entered and linked with any relational database software. These informatics tools are recommended because they ensure that medical entomologists save time, improve data quality, and data collected and shared across multiple studies is in standardized formats hence increasing research outputs.
Advances in high-throughput technologies have enabled extensive generation of multi-level omics data. These data are crucial for systems biology research, though they are complex, heterogeneous, highly dynamic, incomplete and distributed among public databases. This leads to difficulties in data accessibility and often results in errors when data are merged and integrated from varied resources. Therefore, integration and management of systems biological data remain very challenging. To overcome this, we designed and developed a dedicated database system that can serve and solve the vital issues in data management and hereby facilitate data integration, modeling and analysis in systems biology within a sole database. In addition, a yeast data repository was implemented as an integrated database environment which is operated by the database system. Two applications were implemented to demonstrate extensibility and utilization of the system. Both illustrate how the user can access the database via the web query function and implemented scripts. These scripts are specific for two sample cases: 1) Detecting the pheromone pathway in protein interaction networks; and 2) Finding metabolic reactions regulated by Snf1 kinase. In this study we present the design of database system which offers an extensible environment to efficiently capture the majority of biological entities and relations encountered in systems biology. Critical functions and control processes were designed and implemented to ensure consistent, efficient, secure and reliable transactions. The two sample cases on the yeast integrated data clearly demonstrate the value of a sole database environment for systems biology research.
In a typical study of the genetics of a complex human disease, many different analysis programs are used, to test for linkage and association. This requires extensive and careful data reformatting, as many of these analysis programs use differing input formats. Writing scripts to facilitate this can be tedious, time-consuming, and error-prone. To address these issues, the open source Mega2 data reformatting program provides validated and tested data conversions from several commonly-used input formats to many output formats. Mega2, the Manipulation Environment for Genetic Analysis, facilitates the creation of analysis-ready datasets from data gathered as part of a genetic study. It transparently allows users to process genetic data for family-based or case/control studies accurately and efficiently. In addition to data validation checks, Mega2 provides analysis setup capabilities for a broad choice of commonly-used genetic analysis programs. First released in 2000, Mega2 has recently been significantly improved in a number of ways. We have rewritten it in C++ and have reduced its memory requirements. Mega2 now can read input files in LINKAGE, PLINK, and VCF/BCF formats, as well as its own specialized annotated format. It supports conversion to many commonly-used formats including SOLAR, PLINK, Merlin, Mendel, SimWalk2, Cranefoot, IQLS, FBAT, MORGAN, BEAGLE, Eigenstrat, Structure, and PLINK/SEQ. When controlled by a batch file, Mega2 can be used non-interactively in data reformatting pipelines. Support for genetic data from several other species besides humans has been added. By providing tested and validated data reformatting, Mega2 facilitates more accurate and extensive analyses of genetic data, avoiding the need to write, debug, and maintain one's own custom data reformatting scripts. Mega2 is freely available at https://watson.hgen.pitt.edu/register/.
Today researchers can choose from many bioinformatics protocols for all types of life sciences research, computational environments and coding languages. Although the majority of these are open source, few of them possess all virtues to maximize reuse and promote reproducible science. Wikipedia has proven a great tool to disseminate information and enhance collaboration between users with varying expertise and background to author qualitative content via crowdsourcing. However, it remains an open question whether the wiki paradigm can be applied to bioinformatics protocols. We piloted PyPedia, a wiki where each article is both implementation and documentation of a bioinformatics computational protocol in the python language. Hyperlinks within the wiki can be used to compose complex workflows and induce reuse. A RESTful API enables code execution outside the wiki. Initial content of PyPedia contains articles for population statistics, bioinformatics format conversions and genotype imputation. Use of the easy to learn wiki syntax effectively lowers the barriers to bring expert programmers and less computer savvy researchers on the same page. PyPedia demonstrates how wiki can provide a collaborative development, sharing and even execution environment for biologists and bioinformaticians that complement existing resources, useful for local and multi-center research teams. PyPedia is available online at: http://www.pypedia.com. The source code and installation instructions are available at: https://github.com/kantale/PyPedia_server. The PyPedia python library is available at: https://github.com/kantale/pypedia. PyPedia is open-source, available under the BSD 2-Clause License.
Whole genomes, whole exomes and transcriptomes of tumour samples are sequenced routinely to identify the drivers of cancer. The systematic sequencing and analysis of tumour samples, as well other oncogenomic experiments, necessitates the tracking of relevant sample information throughout the investigative process. These meta-data of the sequencing and analysis procedures include information about the samples and projects as well as the sequencing centres, platforms, data locations, results locations, alignments, analysis specifications and further information relevant to the experiments. The current work presents a sample tracking system for oncogenomic studies (Onco-STS) to store these data and make them easily accessible to the researchers who work with the samples. The system is a web application, which includes a database and a front-end web page that allows the remote access, submission and updating of the sample data in the database. The web application development programming framework Grails was used for the development and implementation of the system. The resulting Onco-STS solution is efficient, secure and easy to use and is intended to replace the manual data handling of text records. Onco-STS allows simultaneous remote access to the system making collaboration among researchers more effective. The system stores both information on the samples in oncogenomic studies and details of the analyses conducted on the resulting data. Onco-STS is based on open-source software, is easy to develop and can be modified according to a research group's needs. Hence it is suitable for laboratories that do not require a commercial system.
Neuromusculoskeletal modeling and simulation enable investigation of the neuromusculoskeletal system and its role in human movement dynamics. These methods are progressively introduced into daily clinical practice. However, a major factor limiting this translation is the lack of robust tools for the pre-processing of experimental movement data for their use in neuromusculoskeletal modeling software. This paper presents MOtoNMS (matlab MOtion data elaboration TOolbox for NeuroMusculoSkeletal applications), a toolbox freely available to the community, that aims to fill this lack. MOtoNMS processes experimental data from different motion analysis devices and generates input data for neuromusculoskeletal modeling and simulation software, such as OpenSim and CEINMS (Calibrated EMG-Informed NMS Modelling Toolbox). MOtoNMS implements commonly required processing steps and its generic architecture simplifies the integration of new user-defined processing components. MOtoNMS allows users to setup their laboratory configurations and processing procedures through user-friendly graphical interfaces, without requiring advanced computer skills. Finally, configuration choices can be stored enabling the full reproduction of the processing steps. MOtoNMS is released under GNU General Public License and it is available at the SimTK website and from the GitHub repository. Motion data collected at four institutions demonstrate that, despite differences in laboratory instrumentation and procedures, MOtoNMS succeeds in processing data and producing consistent inputs for OpenSim and CEINMS. MOtoNMS fills the gap between motion analysis and neuromusculoskeletal modeling and simulation. Its support to several devices, a complete implementation of the pre-processing procedures, its simple extensibility, the available user interfaces, and its free availability can boost the translation of neuromusculoskeletal methods in daily and clinical practice.
Next-generation sequencing (NGS) technologies have revolutionarily reshaped the landscape of '-omics' research areas. They produce a plethora of information requiring specific knowledge in sample preparation, analysis and characterization. Additionally, expertise and competencies are required when using bioinformatics tools and methods for efficient analysis, interpretation, and visualization of data. These skills are rarely covered in a single laboratory. More often the samples are isolated and purified in a first laboratory, sequencing is performed by a private company or a specialized lab, while the produced data are analyzed by a third group of researchers. In this scenario, the support, the communication, and the information sharing among researchers represent the key points to build a common knowledge and to meet the project objectives. We present ElGalaxy, a system designed and developed to support collaboration and information sharing among researchers. Specifically, we integrated collaborative functionalities within an application usually adopted by Life Science researchers. ElGalaxy, therefore, is the result of the integration of Galaxy, i.e., a Workflow Management System, with Elgg, i.e., a Social Network Engine. ElGalaxy enables scientists, that work on the same experiment, to collaborate and share information, to discuss about methods, and to evaluate results of the individual steps, as well as of entire activities, performed during their experiments. ElGalaxy also allows a greater team awareness, especially when experiments are carried out with researchers which belong to different and distributed research centers.
The segment overlap score (SOV) has been used to evaluate the predicted protein secondary structures, a sequence composed of helix (H), strand (E), and coil (C), by comparing it with the native or reference secondary structures, another sequence of H, E, and C. SOV's advantage is that it can consider the size of continuous overlapping segments and assign extra allowance to longer continuous overlapping segments instead of only judging from the percentage of overlapping individual positions as Q3 score does. However, we have found a drawback from its previous definition, that is, it cannot ensure increasing allowance assignment when more residues in a segment are further predicted accurately. A new way of assigning allowance has been designed, which keeps all the advantages of the previous SOV score definitions and ensures that the amount of allowance assigned is incremental when more elements in a segment are predicted accurately. Furthermore, our improved SOV has achieved a higher correlation with the quality of protein models measured by GDT-TS score and TM-score, indicating its better abilities to evaluate tertiary structure quality at the secondary structure level. We analyzed the statistical significance of SOV scores and found the threshold values for distinguishing two protein structures (SOV_refine  > 0.19) and indicating whether two proteins are under the same CATH fold (SOV_refine > 0.94 and > 0.90 for three- and eight-state secondary structures respectively). We provided another two example applications, which are when used as a machine learning feature for protein model quality assessment and comparing different definitions of topologically associating domains. We proved that our newly defined SOV score resulted in better performance. The SOV score can be widely used in bioinformatics research and other fields that need to compare two sequences of letters in which continuous segments have important meanings. We also generalized the previous SOV definitions so that it can work for sequences composed of more than three states (e.g., it can work for the eight-state definition of protein secondary structures). A standalone software package has been implemented in Perl with source code released. The software can be downloaded from http://dna.cs.miami.edu/SOV/.
It is now widely-accepted that DNA sequences defining DNA-protein interactions functionally depend upon local biophysical features of DNA backbone that are important in defining sites of binding interaction in the genome (e.g. DNA shape, charge and intrinsic dynamics). However, these physical features of DNA polymer are not directly apparent when analyzing and viewing Shannon information content calculated at single nucleobases in a traditional sequence logo plot. Thus, sequence logos plots are severely limited in that they convey no explicit information regarding the structural dynamics of DNA backbone, a feature often critical to binding specificity. We present TRX-LOGOS, an R software package and Perl wrapper code that interfaces the JASPAR database for computational regulatory genomics. TRX-LOGOS extends the traditional sequence logo plot to include Shannon information content calculated with regard to the dinucleotide-based BI-BII conformation shifts in phosphate linkages on the DNA backbone, thereby adding a visual measure of intrinsic DNA flexibility that can be critical for many DNA-protein interactions. TRX-LOGOS is available as an R graphics module offered at both SourceForge and as a download supplement at this journal. To demonstrate the general utility of TRX logo plots, we first calculated the information content for 416 Saccharomyces cerevisiae transcription factor binding sites functionally confirmed in the Yeastract database and matched to previously published yeast genomic alignments. We discovered that flanking regions contain significantly elevated information content at phosphate linkages than can be observed at nucleobases. We also examined broader transcription factor classifications defined by the JASPAR database, and discovered that many general signatures of transcription factor binding are locally more information rich at the level of DNA backbone dynamics than nucleobase sequence. We used TRX-logos in combination with MEGA 6.0 software for molecular evolutionary genetics analysis to visually compare the human Forkhead box/FOX protein evolution to its binding site evolution. We also compared the DNA binding signatures of human TP53 tumor suppressor determined by two different laboratory methods (SELEX and ChIP-seq). Further analysis of the entire yeast genome, center aligned at the start codon, also revealed a distinct sequence-independent 3 bp periodic pattern in information content, present only in coding region, and perhaps indicative of the non-random organization of the genetic code. TRX-LOGOS is useful in any situation in which important information content in DNA can be better visualized at the positions of phosphate linkages (i.e. dinucleotides) where the dynamic properties of the DNA backbone functions to facilitate DNA-protein interaction.
The graphical visualization of gene expression data using heatmaps has become an integral component of modern-day medical research. Heatmaps are used extensively to plot quantitative differences in gene expression levels, such as those measured with RNAseq and microarray experiments, to provide qualitative large-scale views of the transcriptonomic landscape. Creating high-quality heatmaps is a computationally intensive task, often requiring considerable programming experience, particularly for customizing features to a specific dataset at hand. Software to create publication-quality heatmaps is developed with the R programming language, C++ programming language, and OpenGL application programming interface (API) to create industry-grade high performance graphics. We create a graphical user interface (GUI) software package called HeatmapGenerator for Windows OS and Mac OS X as an intuitive, user-friendly alternative to researchers with minimal prior coding experience to allow them to create publication-quality heatmaps using R graphics without sacrificing their desired level of customization. The simplicity of HeatmapGenerator is that it only requires the user to upload a preformatted input file and download the publicly available R software language, among a few other operating system-specific requirements. Advanced features such as color, text labels, scaling, legend construction, and even database storage can be easily customized with no prior programming knowledge. We provide an intuitive and user-friendly software package, HeatmapGenerator, to create high-quality, customizable heatmaps generated using the high-resolution color graphics capabilities of R. The software is available for Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac OS X. HeatmapGenerator is released under the GNU General Public License and publicly available at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/heatmapgenerator/. The Mac OS X direct download is available at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/heatmapgenerator/files/HeatmapGenerator_MAC_OSX.tar.gz/download. The Windows OS direct download is available at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/heatmapgenerator/files/HeatmapGenerator_WINDOWS.zip/download.
Quantitative co-localization studies strengthen the analysis of fluorescence microscopy-based assays and are essential for illustrating and understanding many cellular processes and interactions. In our earlier study, we presented a rank-based intensity weighting scheme for the quantification of co-localization between structures in fluorescence microscopy images. This method, which uses a combined pixel co-occurrence and intensity correlation approach, is superior to conventional algorithms and provides a more accurate quantification of co-localization. In this brief report we provide the source code and implementation of the rank-weighted co-localization (RWC) algorithm in three (two open source and one proprietary) image analysis platforms. The RWC algorithm has been implemented as a plugin for ImageJ, a module for CellProfiler and an Acapella script for Columbus image analysis software tools. We have provided with a web resource from which users can download plugins and modules implementing the RWC algorithm in various commonly used image analysis platforms. The implementations have been designed for easy incorporation into existing tools in a 'ready-for-use' format. The resources can be accessed through the following web link: http://simpsonlab.pbworks.com/w/page/48541482/Bioinformatic_Tools.
The analysis of complex networks both in general and in particular as pertaining to real biological systems has been the focus of intense scientific attention in the past and present. In this paper we introduce two tools that provide fast and efficient means for the processing and quantification of biological networks like Drosophila tracheoles or leaf venation patterns: the Network Extraction Tool (NET) to extract data and the Graph-edit-GUI (GeGUI) to visualize and modify networks. NET is especially designed for high-throughput semi-automated analysis of biological datasets containing digital images of networks. The framework starts with the segmentation of the image and then proceeds to vectorization using methodologies from optical character recognition. After a series of steps to clean and improve the quality of the extracted data the framework produces a graph in which the network is represented only by its nodes and neighborhood-relations. The final output contains information about the adjacency matrix of the graph, the width of the edges and the positions of the nodes in space. NET also provides tools for statistical analysis of the network properties, such as the number of nodes or total network length. Other, more complex metrics can be calculated by importing the vectorized network to specialized network analysis packages. GeGUI is designed to facilitate manual correction of non-planar networks as these may contain artifacts or spurious junctions due to branches crossing each other. It is tailored for but not limited to the processing of networks from microscopy images of Drosophila tracheoles. The networks extracted by NET closely approximate the network depicted in the original image. NET is fast, yields reproducible results and is able to capture the full geometry of the network, including curved branches. Additionally GeGUI allows easy handling and visualization of the networks.
In genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) and restriction site-associated DNA sequencing (RAD-seq), read depth is important for assessing the quality of genotype calls and estimating allele dosage in polyploids. However, existing pipelines for GBS and RAD-seq do not provide read counts in formats that are both accurate and easy to access. Additionally, although existing pipelines allow previously-mined SNPs to be genotyped on new samples, they do not allow the user to manually specify a subset of loci to examine. Pipelines that do not use a reference genome assign arbitrary names to SNPs, making meta-analysis across projects difficult. We created the software TagDigger, which includes three programs for analyzing GBS and RAD-seq data. The first script, tagdigger_interactive.py, rapidly extracts read counts and genotypes from FASTQ files using user-supplied sets of barcodes and tags. Input and output is in CSV format so that it can be opened by spreadsheet software. Tag sequences can also be imported from the Stacks, TASSEL-GBSv2, TASSEL-UNEAK, or pyRAD pipelines, and a separate file can be imported listing the names of markers to retain. A second script, tag_manager.py, consolidates marker names and sequences across multiple projects. A third script, barcode_splitter.py, assists with preparing FASTQ data for deposit in a public archive by splitting FASTQ files by barcode and generating MD5 checksums for the resulting files. TagDigger is open-source and freely available software written in Python 3. It uses a scalable, rapid search algorithm that can process over 100 million FASTQ reads per hour. TagDigger will run on a laptop with any operating system, does not consume hard drive space with intermediate files, and does not require programming skill to use.
Medulloblastoma (MB) is a highly malignant and heterogeneous brain tumour that is the most common cause of cancer-related deaths in children. Increasing availability of genomic data over the last decade had resulted in improvement of human subtype classification methods, and the parallel development of MB mouse models towards identification of subtype-specific disease origins and signaling pathways. Despite these advances, MB classification schemes remained inadequate for personalized prediction of MB subtypes for individual patient samples and across model systems. To address this issue, we developed the Medullo-Model to Subtypes ( MM2S ) classifier, a new method enabling classification of individual gene expression profiles from MB samples (patient samples, mouse models, and cell lines) against well-established molecular subtypes [Genomics 106:96-106, 2015]. We demonstrated the accuracy and flexibility of MM2S in the largest meta-analysis of human patients and mouse models to date. Here, we present a new functional package that provides an easy-to-use and fully documented implementation of the MM2S method, with additional functionalities that allow users to obtain graphical and tabular summaries of MB subtype predictions for single samples and across sample replicates. The flexibility of the MM2S package promotes incorporation of MB predictions into large Medulloblastoma-driven analysis pipelines, making this tool suitable for use by researchers. The MM2S package is applied in two case studies involving human primary patient samples, as well as sample replicates of the GTML mouse model. We highlight functions that are of use for species-specific MB classification, across individual samples and sample replicates. We emphasize on the range of functions that can be used to derive both singular and meta-centric views of MB predictions, across samples and across MB subtypes. Our MM2S package can be used to generate predictions without having to rely on an external web server or additional sources. Our open-source package facilitates and extends the MM2S algorithm in diverse computational and bioinformatics contexts. The package is available on CRAN, at the following URL: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/MM2S/, as well as on Github at the following URLs: https://github.com/DGendoo and https://github.com/bhklab.
Matched sequencing of both tumor and normal tissue is routinely used to classify variants of uncertain significance (VUS) into somatic vs. germline. However, assays used in molecular diagnostics focus on known somatic alterations in cancer genes and often only sequence tumors. Therefore, an algorithm that reliably classifies variants would be helpful for retrospective exploratory analyses. Contamination of tumor samples with normal cells results in differences in expected allelic fractions of germline and somatic variants, which can be exploited to accurately infer genotypes after adjusting for local copy number. However, existing algorithms for determining tumor purity, ploidy and copy number are not designed for unmatched short read sequencing data. We describe a methodology and corresponding open source software for estimating tumor purity, copy number, loss of heterozygosity (LOH), and contamination, and for classification of single nucleotide variants (SNVs) by somatic status and clonality. This R package, PureCN, is optimized for targeted short read sequencing data, integrates well with standard somatic variant detection pipelines, and has support for matched and unmatched tumor samples. Accuracy is demonstrated on simulated data and on real whole exome sequencing data. Our algorithm provides accurate estimates of tumor purity and ploidy, even if matched normal samples are not available. This in turn allows accurate classification of SNVs. The software is provided as open source (Artistic License 2.0) R/Bioconductor package PureCN (http://bioconductor.org/packages/PureCN/).
In order to better define regions of similarity among related protein structures, it is useful to identify the residue-residue correspondences among proteins. Few codes exist for constructing a one-to-many multiple sequence alignment derived from a set of structure or sequence alignments, and a need was evident for creating such a tool for combining pairwise structure alignments that would allow for insertion of gaps in the reference structure. This report describes a new Python code, CombAlign, which takes as input a set of pairwise sequence alignments (which may be structure based) and generates a one-to-many, gapped, multiple structure- or sequence-based sequence alignment (MSSA). The use and utility of CombAlign was demonstrated by generating gapped MSSAs using sets of pairwise structure-based sequence alignments between structure models of the matrix protein (VP40) and pre-small/secreted glycoprotein (sGP) of Reston Ebolavirus and the corresponding proteins of several other filoviruses. The gapped MSSAs revealed structure-based residue-residue correspondences, which enabled identification of structurally similar versus differing regions in the Reston proteins compared to each of the other corresponding proteins. CombAlign is a new Python code that generates a one-to-many, gapped, multiple structure- or sequence-based sequence alignment (MSSA) given a set of pairwise sequence alignments (which may be structure based). CombAlign has utility in assisting the user in distinguishing structurally conserved versus divergent regions on a reference protein structure relative to other closely related proteins. CombAlign was developed in Python 2.6, and the source code is available for download from the GitHub code repository.
The aim of this paper is to provide a general discussion, algorithm, and actual working programs of the deformation method for fast simulation of biological tissue formed by fibers and fluid. In order to demonstrate the benefit of the clinical applications software, we successfully used our computational program to deform a 3D breast image acquired from patients, using a 3D scanner, in a real hospital environment. The method implements a quasi-static solution for elastic global deformations of objects. Each pair of vertices of the surface is connected and defines an elastic fiber. The set of all the elastic fibers defines a mesh of smaller size than the volumetric meshes, allowing for simulation of complex objects with less computational effort. The behavior similar to the stress tensor is obtained by the volume conservation equation that mixes the 3D coordinates. Step by step, we show the computational implementation of this approach. As an example, a 2D rectangle formed by only 4 vertices is solved and, for this simple geometry, all intermediate results are shown. On the other hand, actual implementations of these ideas in the form of working computer routines are provided for general 3D objects, including a clinical application.
Next-generation sequencing can determine DNA bases and the results of sequence alignments are generally stored in files in the Sequence Alignment/Map (SAM) format and the compressed binary version (BAM) of it. SAMtools is a typical tool for dealing with files in the SAM/BAM format. SAMtools has various functions, including detection of variants, visualization of alignments, indexing, extraction of parts of the data and loci, and conversion of file formats. It is written in C and can execute fast. However, SAMtools requires an additional implementation to be used in parallel with, for example, OpenMP (Open Multi-Processing) libraries. For the accumulation of next-generation sequencing data, a simple parallelization program, which can support cloud and PC cluster environments, is required. We have developed cljam using the Clojure programming language, which simplifies parallel programming, to handle SAM/BAM data. Cljam can run in a Java runtime environment (e.g., Windows, Linux, Mac OS X) with Clojure. Cljam can process and analyze SAM/BAM files in parallel and at high speed. The execution time with cljam is almost the same as with SAMtools. The cljam code is written in Clojure and has fewer lines than other similar tools.
Next-generation sequencing and metagenome projects yield a large number of new genomes that need further annotations, such as identification of enzymes and metabolic pathways, or analysis of metabolic strategies of newly sequenced species in comparison to known organisms. While methods for enzyme identification are available, development of the command line tools for high-throughput comparative analysis and visualization of identified enzymes is lagging. A set of perl scripts has been developed to perform automated data retrieval from the KEGG database using its new REST program application interface. Enrichment or depletion in metabolic pathways is evaluated using the two-tailed Fisher exact test followed by Benjamini and Hochberg correction. Comparative analysis of a given set of enzymes with a specified reference organism includes mapping to known metabolic pathways, finding shared and unique enzymes, generating links to visualize maps at KEGG Pathway, computing enrichment of the pathways, listing the non-mapped enzymes. EC2KEGG provides a platform independent toolkit for automated comparison of identified sets of enzymes from newly sequenced organisms against annotated reference genomes. The tool can be used both for manual annotations of individual species and for high-throughput annotations as part of a computational pipeline. The tool is publicly available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/ec2kegg/.
We previously presented a group theoretical model that describes psychiatric patient states or clinical data in a graded vector-like format based on modulo groups. Meanwhile, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5, the current version), is frequently used for diagnosis in daily psychiatric treatments and biological research. The diagnostic criteria of DSM-5 contain simple binominal items relating to the presence or absence of specific symptoms. In spite of its simple form, the practical structure of the DSM-5 system is not sufficiently systemized for data to be treated in a more rationally sophisticated way. To view the disease states in terms of symmetry in the manner of abstract algebra is considered important for the future systematization of clinical medicine. We provide a simple idea for the practical treatment of the psychiatric diagnosis/score of DSM-5 using depressive symptoms in line with our previously proposed method. An expression is given employing modulo-2 and -7 arithmetic (in particular, additive group theory) for Criterion A of a 'major depressive episode' that must be met for the diagnosis of 'major depressive disorder' in DSM-5. For this purpose, the novel concept of an imaginary value 0 that can be recognized as an explicit 0 or implicit 0 was introduced to compose the model. The zeros allow the incorporation or deletion of an item between any other symptoms if they are ordered appropriately. Optionally, a vector-like expression can be used to rate/select only specific items when modifying the criterion/scale. Simple examples are illustrated concretely. Further development of the proposed method for the criteria/scale of a disease is expected to raise the level of formalism of clinical medicine to that of other fields of natural science.