title: On the relationship between GC content and the number of predicted microRNA binding sites by MicroInspector.
abstract: MicroRNA GC content and length is believed to play a role in the prediction of putative microRNA targets. MicroInspector was evaluated to determine the extent to which these characteristics of microRNAs play a role in binding site predictive accuracy. A strong bias towards under predicting the number of expected bindings sites for low GC content sequences was observed, especially for microRNAs with <50% GC content. Researchers working with organisms with unusually low GC content should be aware of this bias.
authors.affiliation: Southwestern College, 900 Otay Lakes Road, Chula Vista, CA 91910, USA.
authors.forename: Nicole
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Davis
authors.forename: Natasha
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Biddlecom
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Hecht
authors.forename: Gary B
authors.initials: GB
authors.lastname: Fogel
mesh_terms: D001482:Base Composition; D001665:Binding Sites / Q000235:genetics; D003198:Computer Simulation; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D006801:Humans; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000737:chemistry*; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D017423:Sequence Analysis, RNA / Q000379:methods*; D012984:Software; D014584:User-Computer Interface
chemical_list: D035683:MicroRNAs