ENCODE data in the UCSC Genome Browser: year 5 update.

The Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE), http://encodeproject.org, has completed its fifth year of scientific collaboration to create a comprehensive catalog of functional elements in the human genome, and its third year of investigations in the mouse genome. Since the last report in this journal, the ENCODE human data repertoire has grown by 898 new experiments (totaling 2886), accompanied by a major integrative analysis. In the mouse genome, results from 404 new experiments became available this year, increasing the total to 583, collected during the course of the project. The University of California, Santa Cruz, makes this data available on the public Genome Browser http://genome.ucsc.edu for visual browsing and data mining. Download of raw and processed data files are all supported. The ENCODE portal provides specialized tools and information about the ENCODE data sets.

The UCSC Genome Browser database: extensions and updates 2013.

The University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) Genome Browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu) offers online public access to a growing database of genomic sequence and annotations for a wide variety of organisms. The Browser is an integrated tool set for visualizing, comparing, analysing and sharing both publicly available and user-generated genomic datasets. As of September 2012, genomic sequence and a basic set of annotation 'tracks' are provided for 63 organisms, including 26 mammals, 13 non-mammal vertebrates, 3 invertebrate deuterostomes, 13 insects, 6 worms, yeast and sea hare. In the past year 19 new genome assemblies have been added, and we anticipate releasing another 28 in early 2013. Further, a large number of annotation tracks have been either added, updated by contributors or remapped to the latest human reference genome. Among these are an updated UCSC Genes track for human and mouse assemblies. We have also introduced several features to improve usability, including new navigation menus. This article provides an update to the UCSC Genome Browser database, which has been previously featured in the Database issue of this journal.

The UCSC Genome Browser database: extensions and updates 2011.

The University of California Santa Cruz Genome Browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu) offers online public access to a growing database of genomic sequence and annotations for a wide variety of organisms. The Browser is an integrated tool set for visualizing, comparing, analyzing and sharing both publicly available and user-generated genomic data sets. In the past year, the local database has been updated with four new species assemblies, and we anticipate another four will be released by the end of 2011. Further, a large number of annotation tracks have been either added, updated by contributors, or remapped to the latest human reference genome. Among these are new phenotype and disease annotations, UCSC genes, and a major dbSNP update, which required new visualization methods. Growing beyond the local database, this year we have introduced 'track data hubs', which allow the Genome Browser to provide access to remotely located sets of annotations. This feature is designed to significantly extend the number and variety of annotation tracks that are publicly available for visualization and analysis from within our site. We have also introduced several usability features including track search and a context-sensitive menu of options available with a right-click anywhere on the Browser's image.

ENCODE whole-genome data in the UCSC Genome Browser: update 2012.

The Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Consortium is entering its 5th year of production-level effort generating high-quality whole-genome functional annotations of the human genome. The past year has brought the ENCODE compendium of functional elements to critical mass, with a diverse set of 27 biochemical assays now covering 200 distinct human cell types. Within the mouse genome, which has been under study by ENCODE groups for the past 2 years, 37 cell types have been assayed. Over 2000 individual experiments have been completed and submitted to the Data Coordination Center for public use. UCSC makes this data available on the quality-reviewed public Genome Browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu) and on an early-access Preview Browser (http://genome-preview.ucsc.edu). Visual browsing, data mining and download of raw and processed data files are all supported. An ENCODE portal (http://encodeproject.org) provides specialized tools and information about the ENCODE data sets.

ENCODE whole-genome data in the UCSC genome browser (2011 update).

The ENCODE project is an international consortium with a goal of cataloguing all the functional elements in the human genome. The ENCODE Data Coordination Center (DCC) at the University of California, Santa Cruz serves as the central repository for ENCODE data. In this role, the DCC offers a collection of high-throughput, genome-wide data generated with technologies such as ChIP-Seq, RNA-Seq, DNA digestion and others. This data helps illuminate transcription factor-binding sites, histone marks, chromatin accessibility, DNA methylation, RNA expression, RNA binding and other cell-state indicators. It includes sequences with quality scores, alignments, signals calculated from the alignments, and in most cases, element or peak calls calculated from the signal data. Each data set is available for visualization and download via the UCSC Genome Browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu/). ENCODE data can also be retrieved using a metadata system that captures the experimental parameters of each assay. The ENCODE web portal at UCSC (http://encodeproject.org/) provides information about the ENCODE data and links for access.

The UCSC Genome Browser database: update 2011.

The University of California, Santa Cruz Genome Browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu) offers online access to a database of genomic sequence and annotation data for a wide variety of organisms. The Browser also has many tools for visualizing, comparing and analyzing both publicly available and user-generated genomic data sets, aligning sequences and uploading user data. Among the features released this year are a gene search tool and annotation track drag-reorder functionality as well as support for BAM and BigWig/BigBed file formats. New display enhancements include overlay of multiple wiggle tracks through use of transparent coloring, options for displaying transformed wiggle data, a 'mean+whiskers' windowing function for display of wiggle data at high zoom levels, and more color schemes for microarray data. New data highlights include seven new genome assemblies, a Neandertal genome data portal, phenotype and disease association data, a human RNA editing track, and a zebrafish Conservation track. We also describe updates to existing tracks.

Creation of a genome-wide metabolic pathway database for Populus trichocarpa using a new approach for reconstruction and curation of metabolic pathways for plants.

Metabolic networks reconstructed from sequenced genomes or transcriptomes can help visualize and analyze large-scale experimental data, predict metabolic phenotypes, discover enzymes, engineer metabolic pathways, and study metabolic pathway evolution. We developed a general approach for reconstructing metabolic pathway complements of plant genomes. Two new reference databases were created and added to the core of the infrastructure: a comprehensive, all-plant reference pathway database, PlantCyc, and a reference enzyme sequence database, RESD, for annotating metabolic functions of protein sequences. PlantCyc (version 3.0) includes 714 metabolic pathways and 2,619 reactions from over 300 species. RESD (version 1.0) contains 14,187 literature-supported enzyme sequences from across all kingdoms. We used RESD, PlantCyc, and MetaCyc (an all-species reference metabolic pathway database), in conjunction with the pathway prediction software Pathway Tools, to reconstruct a metabolic pathway database, PoplarCyc, from the recently sequenced genome of Populus trichocarpa. PoplarCyc (version 1.0) contains 321 pathways with 1,807 assigned enzymes. Comparing PoplarCyc (version 1.0) with AraCyc (version 6.0, Arabidopsis [Arabidopsis thaliana]) showed comparable numbers of pathways distributed across all domains of metabolism in both databases, except for a higher number of AraCyc pathways in secondary metabolism and a 1.5-fold increase in carbohydrate metabolic enzymes in PoplarCyc. Here, we introduce these new resources and demonstrate the feasibility of using them to identify candidate enzymes for specific pathways and to analyze metabolite profiling data through concrete examples. These resources can be searched by text or BLAST, browsed, and downloaded from our project Web site (http://plantcyc.org).