- Article -
| In Silico Biology 2, 0012 (2002); ©2002, Bioinformation Systems e.V. |
In silico determination of potential antisense targets for human beta-globin variants
Patrizio Arrigo1, Giovanni Ivaldi2 and Pasquale Paolo Cardo3
1 CNR - Istituto Circuiti Elettronici, via De Marini, 6 – Genova
E-mail: arrigo@ice.ge.cnr.it
2 Ospedali Galliera - Laboratorio di Genetica Umana, via Mura delle Cappuccine, 14 - Genova
3 Università degli Studi di Genova - Dip. Scienze della Salute, v.le Benedetto XV, 7 - Genova
Edited by E. Wingender; received October 16, 2001; revised December 12, 2001; accepted January 9, 2002; published March 25, 2002
Abstract
The functional characterisation of available genomic sequences is the major task of the research in the post-genome era. This complex task requires an integrative approach of high-throughput systems with in vitro and in vivo models in order to have a reliable evaluation of the biological function. The oligonucleotide antisense technology is one of the most promising approaches for the investigation of gene function; the crucial point of antisense experiments is the identification of optimal target sites for hybridisation. In this paper we have applied a bioinformatic tool for the recognition of optimal antisense targets. In order to evaluate the effect of mutational events on target selection we have tested the program on a sample of human b-hemoglobin variants. The proposed algorithm software will be integrated in a web based tool at the site: http://www.nettab.org/agewa .
Key words: Antisense oligonucleotide, hybridisation, point mutation, molecular diagnostic, gene functionalization, artificial neural networks, unsupervised learning