Question

Which of the following is untrue regarding UniGene?

(a) It is an NCBI EST cluster database

(b) Overlapping EST sequences are computationally processed to represent a single expressed gene

(c) Each cluster is a set of overlapping EST sequences

(d) The overlapping EST sequences are computationally processed to represent a set of expressed genes

The question was posed to me during an interview.

I'm obligated to ask this question of Sequence topic in section Functional Genomics & Proteomics of Bioinformatics

Answer 1

The correct choice is (d) The overlapping EST sequences are computationally processed to represent a set of expressed genes

The best I can explain: The database is constructed based on combined information from dbEST, GenBank mRNA database, and “electronically spliced” genomic DNA. Only ESTs with 3’poly-A ends are clustered to minimize the problem of chimerism. The resulting 3’EST sequences provide more unique representation of the transcripts.