Sequence ontology terminology for gene regulation

WormBase 2024: status and transitioning to Alliance infrastructure

WormBase has been the major repository and knowledgebase of information about the genome and genetics of Caenorhabditis elegans and other nematodes of experimental interest for over 2 decades. We have 3 goals: to keep current with the fast-paced C. elegans research, to provide better integration with other resources, and to be sustainable. Here, we discuss the current state of WormBase as well as progress and plans for moving core WormBase infrastructure to the Alliance of Genome Resources (the Alliance). As an Alliance member, WormBase will continue to interact with the C. elegans community, develop new features as needed, and curate key information from the literature and large-scale projects.

When a Synonymous Variant Is Nonsynonymous

Term synonymous variation is widely used, but frequently in a wrong or misleading meaning and context. Twenty three point eight % of possible nucleotide substitution types in the universal genetic code are for synonymous amino acid changes, but when these variants have a phenotype and functional effect, they are very seldom synonymous. Such variants may manifest changes at DNA, RNA and/or protein levels. Large numbers of variations are erroneously annotated as synonymous, which causes problems e.g., in clinical genetics and diagnosis of diseases. To facilitate precise communication, novel systematics and nomenclature are introduced for variants that when looking only at the genetic code seem like synonymous, but which have phenotypes. A new term, unsense variant is defined as a substitution in the mRNA coding region that affects gene expression and protein production without introducing a stop codon in the variation site. Such variants are common and need to be correctly annotated. Proper naming and annotation are important also to increase awareness of these variants and their consequences.

Analysis of the landscape of human enhancer sequences in biological databases

The process of gene regulation extends as a network in which both genetic sequences and proteins are involved. The levels of regulation and the mechanisms involved are multiple. Transcription is the main control mechanism for most genes, being the downstream steps responsible for refining the transcription patterns. In turn, gene transcription is mainly controlled by regulatory events that occur at promoters and enhancers. Several studies are focused on analyzing the contribution of enhancers in the development of diseases and their possible use as therapeutic targets. The study of regulatory elements has advanced rapidly in recent years with the development and use of next generation sequencing techniques. All this information has generated a large volume of information that has been transferred to a growing number of public repositories that store this information. In this article, we analyze the content of those public repositories that contain information about human enhancers with the aim of detecting whether the knowledge generated by scientific research is contained in those databases in a way that could be computationally exploited. The analysis will be based on three main aspects identified in the literature: types of enhancers, type of evidence about the enhancers, and methods for detecting enhancer-promoter interactions. Our results show that no single database facilitates the optimal exploitation of enhancer data, most types of enhancers are not represented in the databases and there is need for a standardized model for enhancers. We have identified major gaps and challenges for the computational exploitation of enhancer data.

Harmonizing model organism data in the Alliance of Genome Resources

The Alliance of Genome Resources (the Alliance) is a combined effort of 7 knowledgebase projects: Saccharomyces Genome Database, WormBase, FlyBase, Mouse Genome Database, the Zebrafish Information Network, Rat Genome Database, and the Gene Ontology Resource. The Alliance seeks to provide several benefits: better service to the various communities served by these projects; a harmonized view of data for all biomedical researchers, bioinformaticians, clinicians, and students; and a more sustainable infrastructure. The Alliance has harmonized cross-organism data to provide useful comparative views of gene function, gene expression, and human disease relevance. The basis of the comparative views is shared calls of orthology relationships and the use of common ontologies. The key types of data are alleles and variants, gene function based on gene ontology annotations, phenotypes, association to human disease, gene expression, protein-protein and genetic interactions, and participation in pathways. The information is presented on uniform gene pages that allow facile summarization of information about each gene in each of the 7 organisms covered (budding yeast, roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans, fruit fly, house mouse, zebrafish, brown rat, and human). The harmonized knowledge is freely available on the alliancegenome.org portal, as downloadable files, and by APIs. We expect other existing and emerging knowledge bases to join in the effort to provide the union of useful data and features that each knowledge base currently provides.

WormBase in 2022-data, processes, and tools for analyzing Caenorhabditis elegans

WormBase (www.wormbase.org) is the central repository for the genetics and genomics of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. We provide the research community with data and tools to facilitate the use of C. elegans and related nematodes as model organisms for studying human health, development, and many aspects of fundamental biology. Throughout our 22-year history, we have continued to evolve to reflect progress and innovation in the science and technologies involved in the study of C. elegans. We strive to incorporate new data types and richer data sets, and to provide integrated displays and services that avail the knowledge generated by the published nematode genetics literature. Here, we provide a broad overview of the current state of WormBase in terms of data type, curation workflows, analysis, and tools, including exciting new advances for analysis of single-cell data, text mining and visualization, and the new community collaboration forum. Concurrently, we continue the integration and harmonization of infrastructure, processes, and tools with the Alliance of Genome Resources, of which WormBase is a founding member.

The Gene Regulation Knowledge Commons: The action area of GREEKC

The COST Action Gene Regulation Ensemble Effort for the Knowledge Commons (GREEKC, CA15205, www.greekc.org) organized nine workshops in a four-year period, starting September 2016. The workshops brought together a wide range of experts from all over the world working on various parts of the knowledge cycle that is central to understanding gene regulatory mechanisms. The discussions between ontologists, curators, text miners, biologists, bioinformaticians, philosophers and computational scientists spawned a host of activities aimed to update and standardise existing knowledge management workflows, encourage new experimental approaches and thoroughly involve end-users in the process to design the Gene Regulation Knowledge Commons (GRKC). The GREEKC consortium describes its main achievements, contextualised in a state-of-the-art of current tools and resources that today represent the GRKC.