Training

This workshop will introduce basic bioinformatics approaches that are used to find, analyse and understand nucleotide or protein sequences. It will explore how to conduct searches across biological databases using both metadata and sequence data approaches. The course will explain how sequence searching techniques work, and how to use them effectively to find relevant results. Practical exercises will develop skills in locating and aligning sequences, and provide guidance on how to learn more about the biological context of nucleotide or protein sequences.

The key areas covered by the workshop will include:

• Sequence data resources at EMBL-EBI
• Tools for sequence searching and alignments
• Methods for conducting phylogenetic analysis
• Using sequences to investigate families, function and structure

During this course you will learn about:

• EBI Search interface, ENA and UniProt databases
• Sequence searching tools – FASTA, BLAST, PSI-SEARCH, HMMER
• Multiple sequence alignment tools – Clustal Omega, MUSCLE
• Phylogeny tools
• InterPro, PDBe, Ensembl VEP

After this course you should be able to:

• Understand basic methods for bioinformatics data searching
• Find relevant database entries using sequence searching methods
• Conduct alignments of multiple sequences via a variety of methods
• Construct basic phylogenetic trees
• Perform further analyses on sequences to help examine their possible functions