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Ancora: a web resource for exploring highly conserved noncoding elements and their association with developmental regulatory genes

Pär G Engström1,2,3, David Fredman1,2 and Boris Lenhard1,2*

Author Affiliations

1 Computational Biology Unit, Bergen Center for Computational Science, University of Bergen, Thormøhlensgate, N-5008 Bergen, Norway

2 Sars Centre for Marine Molecular Biology, University of Bergen, N-5008 Bergen, Norway

3 Programme for Genomics and Bioinformatics, Department of Cell and Molecular Biology, Karolinska Institutet, S-17177 Stockholm, Sweden

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Genome Biology 2008, 9:R34 doi:10.1186/gb-2008-9-2-r34

Published: 15 February 2008

Abstract

Metazoan genomes contain arrays of highly conserved noncoding elements (HCNEs) that span developmental regulatory genes and define regulatory domains. We describe Ancora http://ancora.genereg.net webcite, a web resource that provides data and tools for exploring genomic organization of HCNEs for multiple genomes. Ancora includes a genome browser that shows HCNE locations and features novel HCNE density plots as a powerful tool to discover developmental regulatory genes and distinguish their regulatory elements and domains.