New Online Tutorials for Sequence Similarity Search Tools BLAST and FASTA

Comprehensive tutorials on sequence similarity search tools BLAST and FASTA enable researchers to quickly and effectively use these invaluable resources.

Seattle (PRWEB) July 17, 2008 -- OpenHelix (http://www.openhelix.com) today announced the availability of new tutorial suites on two highly used sequence similarity search resources: BLAST (http://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) and FASTA (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/Tools/fasta33/index.html). BLAST, from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at NIH and FASTA, accessed through a web interface at European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI), are both excellent and widely used tools for finding sequence similarities for proteins and nucleic acids.

The tutorial suites, available for single purchase or through a low-priced yearly subscription to all OpenHelix tutorials, contain a narrated, self-run, online tutorial, slides with full script, handouts and exercises. With the tutorials, researchers can quickly learn to effectively and efficiently use these resources. These tutorials will teach users:

* the principles of sequence comparison

* basic explanations of scoring matrices and alignments

* main features of the FASTA and BLAST algorithms

* how to perform a sequence similarity search

* how to view and interpret the similarity results

* how to find additional biological information about matching sequences

To find out more about these and other tutorial suites visit the OpenHelix Tutorial Catalog (http://inter.viewcentral.com/events/cust/catalog.aspx?cid=openhelix) and OpenHelix (http://www.openhelix.com) or visit the OpenHelix Blog (http://www.openhelix.com/blog) for up-to-date information on genomics.

About OpenHelix

OpenHelix, LLC, (http://www.openhelix.com) provides the genomics knowledge you need when you need it. OpenHelix currently provides online self-run tutorials and on-site training for institutions and companies on the most powerful and popular free, web based, publicly accessible bioinformatics resources. In addition, OpenHelix is contracted by resource providers to provide comprehensive, long-term training and outreach programs.

###