title: From expression cloning to gene modeling: the development of Xenopus gene sequence resources.
abstract: The Xenopus community has made concerted efforts over the last 10-12 years systematically to improve the available sequence information for this amphibian model organism ideally suited to the study of early development in vertebrates. Here I review progress in the collection of both sequence data and physical clone reagents for protein coding genes. I conclude that we have cDNA sequences for around 50% and full-length clones for about 35% of the genes in Xenopus tropicalis, and similar numbers but a smaller proportion for Xenopus laevis. In addition, I demonstrate that the gaps in the current genome assembly create problems for the computational elucidation of gene sequences, and suggest some ways to ameliorate the effects of this.
authors.affiliation: Division of Systems Biology, MRC National Institute for Medical Research, The Ridgeway, Mill Hill, London, United Kingdom. m.gilchrist@nimr.mrc.ac.uk
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Gilchrist
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D018076:DNA, Complementary / Q000737:chemistry; D020224:Expressed Sequence Tags; D016678:Genome; D008957:Models, Genetic; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000737:chemistry; D017421:Sequence Analysis; D059467:Transcriptome; D014981:Xenopus / Q000235:genetics*; D029867:Xenopus Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D014982:Xenopus laevis / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D018076:DNA, Complementary; D012333:RNA, Messenger; D029867:Xenopus Proteins