PROMPT: a protein mapping and comparison tool

Background  

Comparison of large protein datasets has become a standard task in bioinformatics. Typically researchers wish to know whether one group of proteins is significantly enriched in certain annotation attributes or sequence properties compared to another group, and whether this enrichment is statistically significant. In order to conduct such comparisons it is often required to integrate molecular sequence data and experimental information from disparate incompatible sources. While many specialized programs exist for comparisons of this kind in individual problem domains, such as expression data analysis, no generic software solution capable of addressing a wide spectrum of routine tasks in comparative proteomics is currently available.