Genomatix of Munich said it has initiated a project to annotate promoters for the entire human genome.
Using tools it developed, Genomatix said it can characterize large DNA sequences and predict functional promoters on a genomic scale. Promoters act as the molecular “switches” to regulate gene expression.
Genomatix said that based on the first published sequences from the human genome project (chromosomes 21 and 22) its approach is able to predict 50 percent of the previously characterized Polymerase II promoters from DNA sequences.
“From annotation of the two chromosomes (21, 22), we learned that about half of our independent predictions were confirmed by experimental evidence,” said Thomas Werner, CEO of Genomatix. “The fact that our methodology is very specific—low number of false positive predictions—will be of great importance to genome researchers.”