RASTA-Bacteria: a web-based tool for identifying toxin-antitoxin loci in prokaryotes

Emeric W Sevin¹ and Frédérique Barloy-Hubler¹^,2

¹CNRS UMR6061 Génétique et Développement, Université de Rennes 1, IFR 140, Av. du Prof. Léon Bernard, CS 34317, 35043 Rennes, France

²CNRS UMR6026 Interactions Cellulaires et Moléculaires, Groupe DUALS, Université de Rennes 1, IFR140, Campus de Beaulieu, Av. du Général Leclerc, 35042 Rennes, France

author email corresponding author email

Genome Biology 2007, 8:R155doi:10.1186/gb-2007-8-8-r155


Published:	1 August 2007

Subject areas: Bioinformatics, Microbiology and parasitology

Abstract

Toxin/antitoxin (TA) systems, viewed as essential regulators of growth arrest and programmed cell death, are widespread among prokaryotes, but remain sparsely annotated. We present RASTA-Bacteria, an automated method allowing quick and reliable identification of TA loci in sequenced prokaryotic genomes, whether they are annotated open reading frames or not. The tool successfully confirmed all reported TA systems, and spotted new putative loci upon screening of sequenced genomes. RASTA-Bacteria is publicly available at http://genoweb.univ-rennes1.fr/duals/RASTA-Bacteria webcite.