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Chapter 9
CHAPTER 9
BLAST Protocols
This chapter contains protocols for the most common BLAST searches. Because
every BLAST experiment is unique, you should treat the protocols as a starting point
and use your own knowledge about BLAST to modify the procedures. The discus-
sions include what to do, as well as why. Although this approach makes the descrip-
tions more verbose, explaining the logic behind these choices will help you make
intelligent choices when creating your own protocols.
Most BLAST experiments fall into one of two categories: mapping and exploring.
Mapping is the process of finding the position of one sequence within another—for
example, finding a gene within a genome. When mapping, you can expect the align-
ments to be nearly identical, and the coordinates are generally the focus of the results.
When exploring, the goal is usually to find functionally related sequences. When
exploring, your alignment statistics (score, expectation, percent identity, etc.) are
often of greatest importance, at least initially. Making functional and phylogenetic
inferences, especially between distantly related sequences, often requires inspecting
the alignments from a biological rather than a statistical perspective. There is, of
course, a continuum between mapping and exploring, but ...