Database Commons

a catalog of worldwide biological databases

The Virus Variation Resource is a value-added viral sequence data resource hosted by the National Center for Biotechnology Information. The resource is located at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/viruses/variation/ and includes modules for seven viral groups: influenza virus, Dengue virus, West Nile virus, Ebolavirus, MERS coronavirus, Rotavirus A and Zika virus Each module is supported by pipelines that scan newly released GenBank records, annotate genes and proteins and parse sample descriptors and then map them to controlled vocabulary. These processes in turn support a purpose-built search interface where users can select sequences based on standardized gene, protein and metadata terms. Once sequences are selected, a suite of tools for downloading data, multi-sequence alignment and tree building supports a variety of user directed activities. This manuscript describes a series of features and functionalities recently added to the Virus Variation Resource. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research 2016. This work is written by (a) US Government employee(s) and is in the public domain in the US.

Virus Variation (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genomes/VirusVariation/) is a comprehensive, web-based resource designed to support the retrieval and display of large virus sequence datasets. The resource includes a value added database, a specialized search interface and a suite of sequence data displays. Virus-specific sequence annotation and database loading pipelines produce consistent protein and gene annotation and capture sequence descriptors from sequence records then map these metadata to a controlled vocabulary. The database supports a metadata driven, web-based search interface where sequences can be selected using a variety of biological and clinical criteria. Retrieved sequences can then be downloaded in a variety of formats or analyzed using a suite of tools and displays. Over the past 2 years, the pre-existing influenza and Dengue virus resources have been combined into a single construct and West Nile virus added to the resultant resource. A number of improvements were incorporated into the sequence annotation and database loading pipelines, and the virus-specific search interfaces were updated to support more advanced functions. Several new features have also been added to the sequence download options, and a new multiple sequence alignment viewer has been incorporated into the resource tool set. Together these enhancements should support enhanced usability and the inclusion of new viruses in the future.

There is an increasing number of complete and incomplete virus genome sequences available in public databases. This large body of sequence data harbors information about epidemiology, phylogeny, and virulence. Several specialized databases, such as the NCBI Influenza Virus Resource or the Los Alamos HIV database, offer sophisticated query interfaces along with integrated exploratory data analysis tools for individual virus species to facilitate extracting this information. Thus far, there has not been a comprehensive database for dengue virus, a significant public health threat.We have created an integrated web resource for dengue virus. The technology developed for the NCBI Influenza Virus Resource has been extended to process non-segmented dengue virus genomes. In order to allow efficient processing of the dengue genome, which is large in comparison with individual influenza segments, we developed an offline pre-alignment procedure which generates a multiple sequence alignment of all dengue sequences. The pre-calculated alignment is then used to rapidly create alignments of sequence subsets in response to user queries. This improvement in technology will also facilitate the incorporation of additional virus species in the future. The set of virus-specific databases at NCBI, which will be referred to as Virus Variation Resources (VVR), allow users to build complex queries against virus-specific databases and then apply exploratory data analysis tools to the results. The metadata is automatically collected where possible, and extended with data extracted from the literature.The NCBI Dengue Virus Resource integrates dengue sequence information with relevant metadata (sample collection time and location, disease severity, serotype, sequenced genome region) and facilitates retrieval and preliminary analysis of dengue sequences using integrated web analysis and visualization tools.