Figuring out the targets of your favorite miRNA is no simple matter, and if it ranks somewhere between cleaning the bathroom and a trip to the dentist on your list, then you’ll want to check out a new java-based tool called GOmir which makes the miRNA target analysis experience a little less painful.
A group from the Biomedical Research Foundation of the Academy of Athens, in Greece just published the results of their work, which couples a miRNA target prediction and functional analysis (JTarget) with a Gene Ontology function (TAGGO) into one java application (GOmir). GOmir pulls together data from several databases including TargetScan, miRanda, RNAhybrid, PicTar and TarBase, with the added information from Gene Ontology to allow users to generate:
- Consensus predicted miRNA targets.
- Functional analysis
- Full gene description
- Gene ontology clustering
This freely accessible miRNA target prediction application looks to be a pretty slick tool with lots of options and flexibility for the user.
To learn more about how GOmir was designed and tested, go to BMC Bioinformatics, June 2009, or check out BRFAA
to download the application.