title: Tests for the statistical significance of protein sequence similarities in data-bank searches.
abstract: A suite of tests to evaluate the statistical significance of protein sequence similarities is developed for use in data bank searches. The tests are based on the Wilbur-Lipman word-search algorithm, and take into account the sequence lengths and compositions, and optionally the weighting of amino acid matches. The method is extended to allow for the existence of a sequence insertion/deletion within the region of similarity. The accuracy of statistical distributions underlying the tests is validated using randomly generated sequences and real sequences selected at random from the data banks. A computer program to perform the tests is briefly described.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Mathematical Biology, National Institute for Medical Research, UK.
authors.forename: R F
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Mott
authors.forename: T B
authors.initials: TB
authors.lastname: Kirkwood
authors.forename: R N
authors.initials: RN
authors.lastname: Curnow
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D016208:Databases, Factual; D011506:Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid
chemical_list: D011506:Proteins