Structural characterization of genomes by large scale sequence-structure threading: application of reliability analysis in structural genomics.
BACKGROUND
We establish that the occurrence of protein folds among genomes can be accurately described with a Weibull function. Systems which exhibit Weibull character can be interpreted with reliability theory commonly used in engineering analysis. For instance, Weibull distributions are widely used in reliability, maintainability and safety work to model time-to-failure of mechanical devices, mechanisms, building constructions and equipment.


RESULTS
We have found that the Weibull function describes protein fold distribution within and among genomes more accurately than conventional power functions which have been used in a number of structural genomic studies reported to date. It has also been found that the Weibull reliability parameter beta for protein fold distributions varies between genomes and may reflect differences in rates of gene duplication in evolutionary history of organisms.


CONCLUSIONS
The results of this work demonstrate that reliability analysis can provide useful insights and testable predictions in the fields of comparative and structural genomics.
Division of Infectious Diseases, Faculty of Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. artc@interchange.ubc.ca
Artem
A
Cherkasov
Shannan J
SJ
Ho Sui
Robert C
RC
Brunham
Steven J M
SJ
Jones
D019295:Computational Biology / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D030541:Databases, Genetic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D016678:Genome; D023281:Genomics / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D015233:Models, Statistical; D017510:Protein Folding