In the mid 1960's scientists discovered that many genomes contain stretches of highly repetitive DNA sequences ( see Reassociation Kinetics Experiments, and C-Value Paradox ). These sequences were later characterized and placed into five categories:

Simple Repeats - Duplications of simple sets of DNA bases (typically 1-5bp) such as A, CA, CGG etc.
Tandem Repeats - Typically found at the centromeres and telomeres of chromosomes these are duplications of more complex 100-200 base sequences.
Segmental Duplications - Large blocks of 10-300 kilobases which are that have been copied to another region of the genome.
Interspersed Repeats
Processed Pseudogenes, Retrotranscripts, SINES - Non-functional copies of RNA genes which have been reintegrated into the genome with the assitance of a reverse transcriptase.
DNA Transposons
Retrovirus Retrotransposons
Non-Retrovirus Retrotransposons ( LINES )

Currently up to 50% of the human genome is repetitive in nature and as improvements are made in detection methods this number is expected to increase.

On the other hand; In genetics, the term palindrome refers to a sequence of nucleotides along a DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) or RNA (ribonucleic acid) strand that contains the same series of nitrogenous bases regardless from which direction the strand is analyzed. Akin to a language palindrome—wherein a word or phrase is spelled the same left-to-right as right-to-left (e.g., the word RADAR or the phrase "able was I ere I saw elba")—with genetic palindromes it does not matter whether the nucleic acid strand is read starting from the 3' (three prime) end or the 5' (five prime) end of the strand.

Recent research on palindromes centers on understanding palindrome formation during gene amplification. Other studies have attempted to relate palindrome formation to molecular mechanisms involved in double stranded breaks and in the formation of inverted repeats. Assisted by high speed computers, other groups of scientists link palindrome formation to the conservation of genetic information.

Related to the direction of transcription by RNA polymerase, DNA strands have upstream and downstream terminus defined by differing chemical groups at each end. The ends of each strand of DNA or RNA are termed the 5' (phosphate bound to the 5' position carbon) and 3' (phosphate bound to the 3' carbon) ends to indicate a polarity within the molecule. Using the letters A, T, C, G, to represent the nitrogenous bases adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine found in DNA, and the letters A, U, C, G to represent the nitrogenous bases adenine, uracil, cytosine, guanine found in RNA (Note that uracil in RNA replaces the thymine found in DNA), geneticists usually represent DNA by a series of base codes (e.g., 5' AATCGGATTGCA 3'). The base codes are usually arranged from the 5' end to the 3' end.

Because of specific base pairing in DNA (i.e., adenine (A) always bonds with (thymine (T) and cytosine (C) always bonds with guanine (G)) the complimentary stand to the sequence 5' AATCGGATTGCA 3' would be 3' TTAGCCTAACGT 5'.

With palindromes the sequences on the complimentary strands read the same in either direction. For example, a sequence of 5' GAATTC3' on one strand would be complimented by a 3' CTTAAG 5' strand. In either case, when either strand is read from the 5' prime end the sequence is GAATTC. Another example of a palindrome would be the sequence 5' CGAAGC 3' that, when reversed, still reads CGAAGC.

Palindromes are important sequences within nucleic acids. Often they are the site of binding for specific enzymes (e.g., restriction endobucleases) designed to cut the DNA strands at specific locations (i.e., at palindromes).

Palindromes may arise from brakeage and chromosomal inversions that form inverted repeats that compliment each other. When a palindrome results from an inversion, it is often referred to as an inverted repeat. For example, the sequence 5' CGAAGC 3', if inverted (reversed 180°), still reads CGAAGC.

The European Molecular Biology Open Software Suite (EMBOSS) includes some basic tools for finding tandem repeats and inverted repeats (see B.6.22. Applications in group Nucleic:repeats). There are many on-line services providing the EMBOSS tools, for example:

• Wageningen Bioinformatics Webportal EMBOSS explorer
• Mobyle@Pasteur
• Soaplab2 Web Services at Vital-IT

For more sophisticated repeat finding you will want to look at tools using Repbase for example:

• CENSOR
  • CENSOR@GIRI
  • CENSOR@EMBL-EBI
• RepeatMasker
• MUMmer (scan_for_match)
• Emboss Palindrome

Other nucleotide repeat finding methods found by a couple of web searches:

• Tandem Repeats Finder
• RECON
• RepeatRunner
• REPuter
• Imperfect Microsatellite Extractor (IMEx)
• Spectral Repeat Finder (SRF)
• REPFIND
• CRISPRfinder
• GrailEXP
• CONREPP
• find_palindromes
• Palindrome
• EMBOSS Palindrome
• Palindrome Search

Address of the bookmark: http://www.cytoscape.org/

School of Life Sciences

Department of Animal Biology

Applications are invited on a plane paper (along with copies of educational qualifications and experience) from eligible candidates for the selection of following position to work under a collaborative research project entitled “Development and application of high resolution genome conformation capture technology to investigate genome architecture in space and time” between University of Hyderabad and CR Rao advanced Institute of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Sciences, sponsored by Department of Biotechnology, Government of India, New Delhi

Name and No. of positions JRF‐ONE

Emoluments for the position Rs. 25,000/p.m. + Eligible HRA

Qualifications MSc or M.Tech in any branch of biology/bioinformatics/computational biology/computer sciences/Mathematics/Physics

Duration Appointments are made initially for ONE year and can be extended further TWO years or until the duration of project

Our laboratory is interested in understanding signalling and spatiotemporal dynamics of 3‐Dimensional genome architecture and gene expression during embryonic stem cell differentiation by utilizing a combination of cellular, molecular genetics, Biochemical and computational tools in combination with next generation sequencing based chromatin structure analysing methods. Successful candidates shall pursue project related to either experimental or computational analysis of genome and Epigenomics data derived from human and mouse cells. Experience in Computational biology, bioinformatics, statistics, machine learning and algorithmic development is required. Knowledge of programming languages (e.g. C, C++, Perl, Python, Ruby etc.) and statistical framework (e.g. R, matlab, etc.) is preferable. Basic understanding of molecular biology will be an added advantage.

Interested candidates with the above mentioned qualification can send their curriculum vitae to Dr. K. Sreenivasulu, Department of Animal Biology, School of Life Sciences, South campus, University of Hyderabad or via email at positionssklab@gmail.com or svksl@uohyd.ernet.in.

Candidates with CSIR/UGC/ICMR/DBT/BINC qualifications if interested in above mentioned area of research are welcomed to approch principal investigator for a position leading to PhD. Last date for submission of applications is 17/06/2016. Eligible candidates will be called for an interview and they should carry all original certificates of the qualifying exam. No TA/ DA will be paid for attending the interview or at the time of joining the post.

Advertisement: http://www.uohyd.ac.in/images/recruitment/jrf_260516.pdf

More at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/HistoneDB2.0/index.fcgi/browse/

Address of the bookmark: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/HistoneDB2.0/index.fcgi/browse/

MutaBind guides you through this process, step by step, starting with selecting a protein complex and inputting PDB code or uploading PDB files. You can also retrieve results with a job ID number, view help documents, and review the MutaBind method and references.

More at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/mutabind/index.fcgi/

More at http://www.pondiuni.edu.in/news?quicktabs_2=5#quicktabs-2

LPI scores are inversely proportional to the phylogenetic distance between database match sequences and the query genome. These scores are useful not only for large-scalede novo predictions of horizontally transferred proteins, but can also serve as an independent quality control test for potential horizontal transfer candidates identified by alternative methods, especially those based on nucleic acid signatures. Candidates having high LPI scores are unlikely to have been horizontally transferred, since they are highly conserved among closely related organisms.

One unique and powerful feature of the DarkHorse HGT Candidate database is the opportunity to explore the phylogenetic background of potential HGT donors as well as recipients. The breadth of the database allows not only query sequences, but also their database match partners to be evaluated for sequence similarity or novelty compared to taxonomically related organisms.

DarkHorse is configurable for varying degrees of phylogenetic granularity and protein sequence conservation. Users should consult the references cited below for a complete explanation of parameter selection and result interpretation. A brief tutorial page is also available on-line.

Address of the bookmark: http://darkhorse.ucsd.edu/download.html

We developed a novel, self-contained technique named Near HGT, based on the synteny index, to measure the divergence of a gene from its native genomic environment and used it to identify candidate HGT events between closely related strains. The method confirms candidate transferred genes based on the constant relative mutability (CRM). Using CRM, the algorithm assigns a confidence score based on “unusual” sequence divergence. A gene exhibiting exceptional deviations according to both synteny and mutability criteria, is considered a validated HGT product. We first employed the technique to a set of three E. coli strains and detected several highly probable horizontally acquired genes. We then compared the method to existing HGT detection tools using a larger strain data set.

When combined with additional approaches our new algorithm provides richer picture and brings us closer to the goal of detecting all newly acquired genes in a particular strain.

Availability: The method is publicly available athttp://research.haifa.ac.il/~ssagi/software/nearHGT.zip

Address of the bookmark: http://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004408

For the full list of features, improvements and fixes, see the release notes:https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/tools/gbench/releasenotes

New Features

• BLAST Tool: added support for local custom BLAST databases
• Graphical Sequence View: added log scaling option for graph tracks
• Generic Table View: new tutorial added

Bug Fixes and Improvements

• Project Tree View: Genomic Collections/Assemblies now show accessions, not just names
• Tree View: layout updated to better accommodate nodes of different sizes
• Table Import Dialog (MacOS): fixed issue with table visibility
• Fixed bug where different molecules IDs in GenBank could resolve to the same sequence
• Graphical Sequence View: fixed issue where sequence track was not shown for some sequences
• Graphical Sequence View: fixed protein coloration methods
• Graphical Sequence View: improved rendering of Markers to better indicate boundaries and produce higher quality PDF images
• Create Gene Model tool: fixed scenario when gene model tool failed with local sequences
• Search View: ORF Finder – fixed incorrect protein lengths
• Fixed bug with not opening project file (.gbp) on a click
• Fixed issues in GVF import
• Fixed BLAST Search tool against NCBI databases not working
• Fixed tblastn (protein BLAST) not working in standalone mode
• Fixed GTF export failure

Applications are invited for a post in DST, India funded Project entitled: "Positive and negative impacts of macromolecular crowding agents during target site location by DNA binding proteins – origin of optimal search at physiological ionic concentration (Reference Number: ECR/2016/000188) ''. The selected candidate will be appointed purely on temporary basis, initially for two years as a JRF that may be extended to one year of SRF based on the performance.

Position: Junior Research Fellow (1)

Qualifications & Experience: Candidate must have a consistently good academic record with at least 60% marks in all throughout and must have qualified NET/GATE.

Desirable: Basic knowledge in the field of biophysics, molecular simulations and computational biology are desirable.

Salary: Consolidated Rs. 25,000 per month.

Tenure: The project duration is for three years and the selected candidate would be appointed after an interview. Appointment will be purely on temporary basis as stipulated by the existing rules of the University.

Interested candidates need to send an application to the address mentioned below mentioning the name of the project and post applied for (on the cover of the envelope).

The applications along with CV should be mailed at the address given below. Name, address, contact number and e. mail address of two referees must be enclosed with the application. The last date for the application is July 31st 2016.

Dr. Arnab Bhattacharjee (Principal Investigator)
Assistant Professor
School of Computational and Integrative Sciences
Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi-110067
E-mail: arnab@jnu.ac.in

Note: 1. Only shortlisted candidates will be communicated to appear in the interview at SCIS, JNU and no other communications in this regard will be entertained.

2. No TA/DA will be paid for appearing in interview.