PIR Protein Information Resource

The protein sequence database is also a text-numeric database with bibliographic links. It is the largest public domain protein sequence database. The current PIR-PSD release 75.04 (March, 2003) contains more than 280 000 entries of partial or complete protein sequences with information on functionalities of the protein, taxonomy (description of the biological source of the protein), sequence properties, experimental analyses, and bibliographic references. Queries can be started as a text-based search or a sequence similarity search. PIR-PSD contains annotated protein sequences with a superfamily/family classification. 

PIR is produced by the National Biomedical Research Foundation (NBRF) [35]. 

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There are different classes of protein sequence databases. Primary and secondary databases are used to address different aspects of sequence analysis. Composite databases amalgamate a variety of different primary sources to facilitate sequence searching efficiently. The primary structure (amino acid sequence) of a protein is stored in primary databases as linear alphabets that represent the constituent residues. The secondary structure of a protein corresponding to region of local regularity (e.g., a-helices, /1-strands, and turns), which in sequence alignments are often apparent as conserved motifs, is stored in secondary databases as patterns. The tertiary structure of a protein derived from the packing of its secondary structural elements which may form folds and domains is stored in structure databases as sets of atomic coordinates. Some of the most important protein sequence databases are PIR (Protein Information Resource), SWISS-PROT (at EBI and ExPASy), MIPS (Munich Information Center for Protein Sequences), JIPID (Japanese International Protein Sequence Database), and TrEMBL (at EBI). ... 

PIR (Protein Information Resource)-PSD SWISS-PROT (at ExPASy) SWISS-PROT(atEBI) ... 

PIR Protein information resource Protein sequence database http //pir.georgetown.edu/... 

BMRB = BioMagResBank CAP = catabolite gene activator protein CCDC = Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre EBI = European Bioinformatics Institute HIV = human immunodeficiency virus MHC = major histocompatibility complex NCBI = National Center for Biotechnology Information PDB = Protein Data Bank PIR = Protein Information Resource 3DB = three-dimensional database of biomacro-molecular structures. 

PIR (http //pir.georgetown.edu/), Protein Information Resource, located at Georgetown University Medical Center, which has provided the first international Protein Sequence Database. 

The protein sequence databases are the most comprehensive source of information on proteins. The goal of this chapter is to describe the different protein sequence databases available to researchers. It is necessary to distinguish between universal databases that cover proteins from all species and specialized data collections that store information about specific families or groups of proteins, or about the proteins of a specific organism. Two categories of universal protein sequence databases can be discerned simple archives of sequence data and annotated databases in which additional information has been added to the sequence record. The next section describes the Protein Information Resource (PIR), the oldest protein sequence database SWISS-PROT, an annotated universal sequence database and TrEMBL, the supplement of... 

Protein information resource (Barker et al., 1999) was established in 1984 by the National Biomedical Research Foundation (NBRF) as a successor to the original NBRF Protein Sequence Database, developed over 20 years by the late Margaret O. Dayhoff and published as the Atlas of Protein Sequence and Structure (Dayhoff et al., 1965 Dayhoff, 1979). Since 1988 the database has been maintained by PIR-Intemational, a collaboration between the NBRF, the Munich Information Center for Protein Sequences (MIPS), and the Japan International Protein Information Database (JIPID). 

PIR Protein sequence database of Protein Information Resource (PIR)... 

Protein primary structure databases include the following ExPASy Molecular Biology Server (Swiss-Prot) expasy.ch/ Protein Information resources (PIR) pir.georgetown.edu Protein Research Foundation (PRF) prf.or.jp/en/os.html. 

The Protein Information Resources (PIR) (Wu et al., 2002) of NBRF in collaboration with MIPS and JIPID produces the annotated protein sequence database in the PIR-MIPS International Protein Sequence Database (PSD). The PSD is a comprehensive annotated and nonredundant protein sequence database. Its annotation includes concurrent cross-references to other sequence, structure, genomic and citatation databases, as well as functional descriptions and structural features. The PIR-International database is accessible at the PIR site, http //pir, georgetown.edu, and at the MIPS site, http //www.mips.biochem.mpg.de. 

Universal Protein Knowledgebase (UniProt). European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI), Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (SIB), Protein Information Resource (PIR), Georgetown Univ. URL http //www.uniprot.org. Central repository of protein sequence and function created by joining the information contained in Swiss-Prot, TrEMBL, and PIR. A central access point for extensive curated protein information, including function, classification, and cross-reference. 

R. S. Ledley, P. Kourtesis, B. E. Suzek, C. R. Vinayaka, J. Zhang, and W. C. Barker, Nucleic Acids Res., 31, 345 (2003). The Protein Information Resource. Available http // pir.georgetown.edu/home.shtml. 

An important development in high-throughput protein identifieation is the introduction of protein database searching [111]. After separation on ID- or 2D-GE, the proteins were blotted onto a membrane and enzymatically digested after reduction and alkylation. The tryptic peptide mixture is analysed by MALDl-MS to achieve a peptide map or peptide mass fingerprint (PMF). The m/z information of the peptides is used to search the protein database, e.g., the Protein Identification Resource (PIR) database [112-114]. If the mass of just 4-6 tryptic peptides is accurately measured (between 0.1 and 0.01%), a useful database search can be performed. 

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