title: Detection of significant patterns by compression algorithms: the case of approximate tandem repeats in DNA sequences.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Compression algorithms can be used to analyse genetic sequences. A compression algorithm tests a given property on the sequence and uses it to encode the sequence: if the property is true, it reveals some structure of the sequence which can be described briefly, this yields a description of the sequence which is shorter than the sequence of nucleotides given in extenso. The more a sequence is compressed by the algorithm, the more significant is the property for that sequence.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We present a compression algorithm that tests the presence of a particular type of dosDNA (defined ordered sequence-DNA): approximate tandem repeats of small motifs (i.e. of lengths < 4). This algorithm has been experimented with on four yeast chromosomes. The presence of approximate tandem repeats seems to be a uniform structural property of yeast chromosomes.
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire d'Informatique Fondamentale de Lille, CNRS URA 369, Villeneuve d'Ascq, France. rivals@lifl.fr
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Rivals
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Delgrange
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Delahaye
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Dauchet
authors.forename: M O
authors.initials: MO
authors.lastname: Delorme
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hénaut
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ollivier
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D001483:Base Sequence; D015825:Chromosomes, Fungal / Q000235:genetics; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics*; D004271:DNA, Fungal / Q000235:genetics; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D012091:Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012984:Software
chemical_list: D004271:DNA, Fungal; D004247:DNA