title: Parallelized multiple alignment.
abstract: Multiple sequence alignment is a frequently used technique for analyzing sequence relationships. Compilation of large alignments is computationally expensive, but processing time can be considerably reduced when the computational load is distributed over many processors. Parallel processing functionality in the form of single-instruction multiple-data (SIMD) technology was implemented into the multiple alignment program Praline by using 'message passing interface' (MPI) routines. Over the alignments tested here, the parallelized program performed up to ten times faster on 25 processors compared to the single processor version.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Example program code for parallelizing pairwise alignment loops is available from http://mathbio.nimr.mrc.ac.uk/~jkleinj/tools/mpicode. The 'message passing interface' package (MPICH) is available from http:/www.unix.mcs.anl.gov/mpi/mpich.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  jhering@nimr.mrc.ac.uk
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Praline is accessible at http://mathbio.nimr.mrc.ac.uk/praline.
authors.affiliation: Division of Mathematical Biology, National Institute for Medical Research, Mill Hill, London NW7 1AA, UK.
authors.forename: Jens
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kleinjung
authors.forename: Nigel
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Douglas
authors.forename: Jaap
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Heringa
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003205:Computing Methodologies; D030541:Databases, Genetic; D020407:Internet; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D016415:Sequence Alignment / Q000379:methods*; D012984:Software