MULTBLAST: A web application for multiple BLAST searches

• Published in: Bioinformation Vol. 5; no. 5; pp. 224 - 226
• Main Authors: Mittler, Taliah, Levy, Marcel, Chad, Feller, Karen, Schlauch
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Singapore Biomedical Informatics 01-11-2010
• Subjects: Server; Multiple BLAST searches; BLAST; Web application
• ISSN: 0973-8894; 0973-2063; 0973-2063
• DOI: 10.6026/97320630005224

Basic Local Alignment Search Tool, (BLAST) allows the comparison of a query sequence/s to a database of sequences and identifies those sequences that are similar to the query above a user-defined threshold. We have developed a user friendly web application, MULTBLAST that runs a series of BLAST searches on a user-supplied list of proteins against one or more target protein or nucleotide databases. The application pre-processes the data, launches each individual BLAST search on the University of Nevada, Reno's-TimeLogic DeCypher® system (available from Active Motif, Inc.) and retrieves and combines all the results into a simple, easy to read output file. The output file presents the list of the query proteins, followed by the BLAST results for the matching sequences from each target database in consecutive columns. This format is especially useful for either comparing the results from the different target databases, or analyzing the results while keeping the identification of each target database separate.
The application is available at the URLhttp://blastpipe.biochem.unr.edu/