DEG 10, an update of the database of essential genes that includes both protein-coding genes and noncoding genomic elements

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Abstract

The combination of high-density transposon-mediated mutagenesis and high-throughput sequencing has led to significant advancements in research on essential genes, resulting in a dramatic increase in the number of identified prokaryotic essential genes under diverse conditions and a revised essential-gene concept that includes all essential genomic elements, rather than focusing on protein-coding genes only. DEG 10, a new release of the Database of Essential Genes (available at http://www.essentialgene.org), has been developed to accommodate these quantitative and qualitative advancements. In addition to increasing the number of bacterial and archaeal essential genes determined by genome-wide gene essentiality screens, DEG 10 also harbors essential noncoding RNAs, promoters, regulatory sequences and replication origins. These essential genomic elements are determined not only in vitro, but also in vivo, under diverse conditions including those for survival, pathogenesis and antibiotic resistance. We have developed customizable BLAST tools that allow users to perform species- and experiment-specific BLAST searches for a single gene, a list of genes, annotated or unannotated genomes. Therefore, DEG 10 includes essential genomic elements under different conditions in three domains of life, with customizable BLAST tools.

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Tim van Opijnen, Kip Bodi, Andrew Camilli (2009)

Biological pathways are structured in complex networks of interacting genes. Solving the architecture of such networks may provide valuable information, such as how microorganisms cause disease. Here we present a method (Tn-seq) for accurately determining quantitative genetic interactions on a genome-wide scale in microorganisms. Tn-seq is based on the assembly of a saturated Mariner transposon insertion library. After library selection, changes in frequency of each insertion mutant are determined by sequencing of the flanking regions en masse. These changes are used to calculate each mutant’s fitness. Fitness was determined for each gene of the gram-positive bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae, a causative agent of pneumonia and meningitis. A genome-wide screen for genetic interactions identified both alleviating and aggravating interactions that could be further divided into seven distinct categories. Due to the wide activity of the Mariner transposon, Tn-seq has the potential to contribute to the exploration of complex pathways across many different species.

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Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Nucleic Acids Res

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Nucleic Acids Res

Journal ID (publisher-id): nar

Journal ID (hwp): nar

Title: Nucleic Acids Research

Publisher: Oxford University Press

ISSN (Print): 0305-1048

ISSN (Electronic): 1362-4962

Publication date (Print): January 2014

Publication date (Electronic): 15 November 2013

Publication date PMC-release: 15 November 2013

Volume: 42

Issue: D1 , Database issue

Pages: D574-D580

Affiliations

¹Department of Physics, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, People’s Republic of China and ²Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, School of Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit 48201, USA

Author notes

*To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel: +1 313 577 0027; Fax: +1 313 577 5218; Email: rzhang@ 123456med.wayne.edu

Correspondence may also be addressed to Chun-Ting Zhang. Tel: +86 22 2740 2987; Fax: +86 22 2740 2697; Email: ctzhang@ 123456tju.edu.cn

Article

Publisher ID: gkt1131

DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkt1131

PMC ID: 3965060

PubMed ID: 24243843

SO-VID: deff8e94-1915-495c-a597-1e80b5f199b5

License:

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

History

Date received : 16 September 2013

Date revision received : 17 October 2013

Date accepted : 24 October 2013

Page count

Pages: 7

Custom metadata

cover-date 1 January 2014

ScienceOpen disciplines: Genetics

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ScienceOpen disciplines: Genetics

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