Exploring the Feature Viewer

Data visualisation and integration have become increasingly important as biological data continue to grow at exponential rates. The feature viewer (Figure 35) allows you to see different types of protein sequence features such as domains, sites, post-translational modifications, topology, mutagenesis, proteomics-derived peptides, antigenic sequences and natural variants from multiple sources in a single view. You have looked at aspects of this information in the relevant sections of the protein entry. The ‘Feature viewer’ tab in each protein entry allows you to bring all this information together in a single graphical view and use it to understand different aspects of protein function.

Similar to genome viewers, the UniProt feature viewer displays information in tracks. Each track presents a biological category of features, and can be expanded into sub-tracks for a more detailed overview. When an experimentally derived 3D structure is available, this is shown below and the feature selected is also highlighted on this.

Keep it in sight

Showing all co-localised sequence features in one view makes it easier to spot patterns and make inferences. To investigate the involvement of human lipoprotein lipase (UniProtKB entry P06858) in lipoprotein lipase deficiency, a rare autosomal recessive lipid disorder, you can click on the “Sites” track to expand it and see that there are three active sites (Figure 36).

If you want to investigate the potential effect of variants on these sites, click on the “Variants” label to open up the track. Clicking on the second active site at position 183 highlights three disease variants in the same position. You can then zoom into the active site and click on this to see the corresponding positions highlighted across all protein features (Figure 37). In this case, point mutations created at the same residue confirm the variant effect is most probably due to a loss of enzyme function. Clicking on the variant dots opens up an information box with links to relevant publications. This unique functionality lets you view possible variant implications at a glance. Click on  in Figure 37 to view the information about active sites, mutagenesis and variants that you would see for position 183.

Figure 37 Feature Viewer example highlighting natural variants colocated with an active site.

Want to integrate the feature viewer into your website?

The UniProt feature viewer can be integrated into any website. You can choose to keep all available tracks or only those most relevant to you. If you would like to include the feature viewer in your own website or resource, you can find instructions in our technical documentation here.