AspAlt: A tool for inter-database, inter-genomic and user-specific comparative analysis of alternative transcription and alternative splicing in 46 eukaryotes.

We have developed AspAlt-a web-based comparative analytical platform for exploring the variations in alternative transcription (AT) events and alternative splicing (AS) events in eukaryotes. AspAlt provides integrated access to 2.1 million AT-AS annotations from 1,58,876 multi-isoform genes and has the following user-friendly analytical features: (1) advanced graphical display to visualize and analyze AT-AS events in 46 eukaryotic genomes; (2) compare and identify the differences in AT-AS patterns among a group of genes specified by the user or among homologous gene groups; (3) inter-database comparative viewer to analyze the differences in the AT-AS annotations for the same gene among Ensembl, RefSeq and AceView databases; (4) dynamically classify and generate graphical plots of AT-AS events from mRNA annotations submitted by the user; and (5) download genomic AT-AS annotations of 46 eukaryotes in XML and tab-delimited formats. The AspAlt resource is available at http://66.170.16.154/AspAlt.