Bilateral BBSRC-NSF/BIO:Towards detailed and consistent function prediction from protein family databases

由于DNA测序技术的不断发展，我们现在知道了数千种不同生物体的确切基因组成（“基因组”），编码数百万种不同的蛋白质，并且这些数字继续快速增长。但是，仅仅知道这些蛋白质的化学特性（“序列”）只是第一步：最终目标是发现基因和蛋白质如何支持生命的多样性，以及其中一些如何用于商业和生物技术应用。该研究项目将扩大科学家及其学生的能力，通过汇集多种不同的最先进的方法，将他们的分析从序列推进到功能。每一种方法都使用了计算（解决这种规模的问题所必需的）和广泛的生物学专业知识。本项目的一般方法是将蛋白质分类为相关蛋白质家族，并在可能的情况下描述每个家族与功能的关系。这些关系可能非常复杂，科学的准确性将需要应用多种多样的方法。为了实现这一目标，该项目将扩展InterPro，这是一个广泛使用的资源，已经包含（尽管集成有限）三个领先的蛋白质家族和功能分类数据库：PANTHER，Pfam和TIGRFAM。第四个分类资源，结构-功能链接数据库（SFLD），也将被纳入InterPro。这四个数据库使用互补的方法来表示和描述蛋白质的关系，这将被整合，以解决蛋白质功能分类的问题，具有前所未有的准确性，精度和易用性。这项工作的产品将用于改进支持科学界的序列分析工具，以及提供增强的教育材料，并将通过http://ebi.ac.uk/interpro广泛访问。

Thanks to continuing developments in DNA sequencing technology, we now know the exact genetic makeup ("genome") of thousands of different organisms, encoding millions of different proteins, and these numbers continue to grow rapidly. But simply knowing the chemical specification (the "sequence") of these proteins is only a first step: the ultimate goal is to discover how genes and proteins function to support the diversity of life, and also how some of them can be used for commercial and biotechnology applications. This research project will expand the capability of scientists and their students to advance their analyses from sequences to functions, by bringing together multiple different state-of-the-art approaches. Each of these approaches uses both computational (necessary to address a problem of this magnitude) and broad biological expertise.The general approach in this project is to classify proteins into families of related proteins, and, wherever possible, describe how each family relates to function. These relations may be very complex, and scientific accuracy will require application of multiple, diverse methods. In order to accomplish this aim, the project will expand InterPro, a widely used resource that already contains (though with limited integration) three of the leading databases for protein family and functional classification: PANTHER, Pfam and TIGRFAM. A fourth classification resource, the Structure-Function Linkage Database (SFLD), will also be incorporated into InterPro. These four databases use complementary methodologies to represent and describe protein relationships, which will be integrated to address the problem of protein function classification with unprecedented accuracy, precision and ease-of-use. The products of this work will be used to improve sequence analysis tools that support the scientific community, as well as to provide enhanced educational materials, and will be broadly accessible over the web at http://ebi.ac.uk/interpro.