基因功能注释——后基因组时代面临的挑战

Annotation of Gene Function: A Big Challenge in the Post-genomic Era

在已经解序的、数以百计的生物基因组中,存在大量编码未知功能蛋白的基因序列。同时,众多已知功能的酶蛋白在解序的基因组中找不到对应的基因。确定未知功能基因的功能和寻找孤儿酶对应的基因是后基因组时代面临的极具挑战性的科学任务。本文综合讨论了目前基因组中基因功能注释存在的问题及解决这些问题的策略与方法。

A large fraction of predicted genes encodes proteins of unknown biochemical function in all sequenced genomes. Meanwhile,no any sequence information in genomic databases is available for thousands of orphan enzymes which enzyme activities have previously been characterized biochemieally. Annotation of genes with no associated function and elucidation of at least one amino acid sequence for every enzyme with known enzyme activity but no associated sequence are a big challenge for scientists in the post - genomie era. In this paper,drawbacks in the annotation of gene function currently used in genomies and some strategies beneficial to the annotation of gene function are discussed.