miRTarBase: a database curates experimentally validated microRNA-target interactions.
MicroRNAs (miRNAs), i.e. small non-coding RNA molecules (∼22 nt), can bind to one or more target sites on a gene transcript to negatively regulate protein expression, subsequently controlling many cellular mechanisms. A current and curated collection of miRNA-target interactions (MTIs) with experimental support is essential to thoroughly elucidating miRNA functions under different conditions and in different species. As a database, miRTarBase has accumulated more than 3500 MTIs by manually surveying pertinent literature after data mining of the text systematically to filter research articles related to functional studies of miRNAs. Generally, the collected MTIs are validated experimentally by reporter assays, western blot, or microarray experiments with overexpression or knockdown of miRNAs. miRTarBase curates 3576 experimentally verified MTIs between 657 miRNAs and 2297 target genes among 17 species. miRTarBase contains the largest amount of validated MTIs by comparing with other similar, previously developed databases. The MTIs collected in the miRTarBase can also provide a large amount of positive samples to develop computational methods capable of identifying miRNA-target interactions. miRTarBase is now available on http://miRTarBase.mbc.nctu.edu.tw/, and is updated frequently by continuously surveying research articles.
Institute of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, National Chiao Tung University, Hsin-Chu 300, Taiwan.
Sheng-Da
SD
Hsu
Feng-Mao
FM
Lin
Wei-Yun
WY
Wu
Chao
C
Liang
Wei-Chih
WC
Huang
Wen-Ling
WL
Chan
Wen-Ting
WT
Tsai
Goun-Zhou
GZ
Chen
Chia-Jung
CJ
Lee
Chih-Min
CM
Chiu
Chia-Hung
CH
Chien
Ming-Chia
MC
Wu
Chi-Ying
CY
Huang
Ann-Ping
AP
Tsou
Hsien-Da
HD
Huang
D030561:Databases, Nucleic Acid; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000378:metabolism*; D034622:RNA Interference; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000378:metabolism; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D018511:Systems Integration; D014584:User-Computer Interface
D035683:MicroRNAs; D012333:RNA, Messenger