Hoxful Monsters

In order to perform comparative study of Homeodomain containing genes within and in between species ,requires a evolutionary based classification, HomeoDB does that to perfection.

HomeoDB was designed and implemented as a manually curated database to collect and present homeobox genes in an evolutionarily structured way, allowing genes, gene families and gene classes to be compared between species more readily than was possible previously.

In the first release of HomeoDB ,all homeodomain genes from Amphioxus (Branchiostoma floridae ), fruitfly (Drosophila melanogaster and Humans are included .Soon one might expect addition of homeodomain data from other species also.

This new database provides you with the opportunity to do comparisons of Homeobox genes between species by structuring the genes into an evolutionary classification at the level of the gene family and the gene class. HomeoDB will also make Homeobox comparison study lot more easier in these three species now.

HomeoDB v. 1.0 consists of five categories of view:

1) Homepage : Here you can enter to search Homeobox genes of any of the three species.

2) phylogenetic hierarchy views, in which the gene classes and gene families are presented
in a phylogenetic structure.

3) This view of class / family details deals with complete information about particular gene or familiy.

4) domain alignment views, displaying multiple homeodomain sequence alignments.

5) gene information views, listing basic information and links to other databases and databanks.

One can also search directly through ” Search function ” to directly look for gene of interest.All views have cross-links for users to surf from one page to another page.

We just take an example :

Suppose your are interested to look into the NK gene NK4/tinman in these three species ,then just search for NK4 in search box . Then click on GO button.

This will take you to a page ,which displays NK4 omologs in Drosophila ,Apmhioxus and Humans. As all the pages are interlinked ,so you can find your way through easily.

Web address : http://homeodb.cbi.pku.edu.cn/ This web page can be accessed freely.

Reference :

Ying-Fu Zhong, Thomas Butts, Peter W. H. Holland
HomeoDB: a database of homeobox gene diversity.
Evolution and Development , Volume 10 Issue 5 (September/October 2008) P 516-518