XTandem Parser: an open-source library to parse and analyse X!Tandem MS/MS search results.

Identification of proteins by MS plays an important role in proteomics. A crucial step concerns the identification of peptides from MS/MS spectra. The X!Tandem Project (http://www.thegpm.org/tandem) supplies an open-source search engine for this purpose. In this study, we present an open-source Java library called XTandem Parser that parses X!Tandem XML result files into an easily accessible and fully functional object model (http://xtandem-parser.googlecode.com). In addition, a graphical user interface is provided that functions as a usage example and an end-user visualization tool.