The New Jersey Institute of Technology's
Electronic Theses & Dissertations Project

Title:	RNA genome annotation with a focus on T. brucei
Author:	Bucci, Brett
View Online:	njit-etd2008-008 (vii, 37 pages ~ 2.4 MB pdf)
Department:	Department of Computer Science
Degree:	Master of Science
Program:	Computational Biology
Document Type:	Thesis
Advisory Committee:	Wang, Jason T. L. (Committee chair) Sohn, Andrew (Committee member) Theodoratos, Dimitri (Committee member)
Date:	2008-01
Keywords:	RNA genome T. brucei African sleeping sickness
Availability:	Unrestricted
Abstract:	The goal of this project is to identify untranslated regions (UTRs) and UTR-indicating patterns in the genome of T. brucei. T. brucei is an interesting organism, and as the cause of African sleeping sickness -- which infects 300,000-500,000 people and a significant number of cattle annually -- is currently the subject of considerable research. Using existing algorithms, several patterns have been found that may lead to more complete UTR annotations in the T. brucei genome. The most encouraging sequence is the 11-base sequence GAGGGIICG]TGGGG, which appears in five hypothetical genes near the tail. Discovery of several such sequences could guide laboratory experimentation toward more useful results and a better allocation of time and resources.