Selection on the Secondary Structure-test: a test that detects positive and negative selection from a set of orthologs, either small or long ncRNAs.
This repository contains the SSS-test and the local pipeline designed to calculate local blocks from a multi-FASTA file or lncRNA orthologs.
The programs were designed for Unix-based operational systems, so you can use them with Linux or MacOS. For Windows systems you need either specific compilers or a Virtual Machine in addition. To obtain the repository in a Unix machine and use it locally, you can either download the repository directly from the GITHub webpage, or you can clone the repository in the terminal.
News
13.08.2021: Improved tutorial in README file
11.08.2021: Added caution message to Pre-Usage about "Statistics::R"
17.02.2021: Removed line from SSS-test: export $PATH of RNAsnp
23.11.2020: The names of the tools were changed from 'SSS.sh' to 'SSS-test' and 'local.sh' to 'local-structure-pipeline'.
01.05.2019: Requirements for the FASTA header of the input file were simplified.
Cloning the repository on your UNIX machine
git clone https://github.com/waltercostamb/SSS-test
Requirements
Both the SSS-test and local pipeline require additional software, which must be installed previously. To install them, refer to each appropriate link.
Required software:
- RNAsnp: http://rth.dk/resources/rnasnp/software
- muscle aligner: http://www.drive5.com/muscle
- Vienna RNA package: https://www.tbi.univie.ac.at/RNA/#download
- Bio::AlignIO from cpan: https://metacpan.org/pod/Bio::AlignIO
- fasconvert from cpan: https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/FAST/bin/fasconvert
- Statistics::R from cpan: https://metacpan.org/pod/release/GMPASSOS/Statistics-R-0.02/lib/Statistics/R.pm
After installation, follow the complete tutorial below to make sure all is working correctly with your local version of the SSS-test.
Pre-Usage:
- make sure your "Statistics::R" is correctly installed and updated. Your SSS-test results will not be correct if you see the following message on your shell: "Can't locate object method "set" via package "Statistics :: R" at ... PATH_TO / multipleObservationCorrection.pl line 87, <tmp2_file> line 1.". This message indicates the software is incorrectly installed or too old
- if necessary, copy the lib/distParam directory from the RNAsnp sources over to the RNAsnp installation location.
- export the path to RNAsnp installation location:
export RNASNPPATH=/path-to/RNAsnp-1.2 - make sure that all binaries of required software are in the path (with /path-to/ and /RNAsnp/ /ViennaRNA/ etc replaced appropriately; relplot.pl is provided in a subfolder of the share folder of ViennaRNA)
export PATH=$PATH:/path-to/RNAsnp/bin:/path-to/ViennaRNA/bin:/path-to/ViennaRNA/share/ViennaRNA/bin:/path-to/muscle/bin
Bypassing installment requirements
If you do not wish to pre-install the required softwares and just use the SSS-test and local pipelines directly, you can use the nix-bundle available at: http://www.bioinf.uni-leipzig.de/Software/SSS-test/
Just download the SSS-test inside the nix-bundle directory and use the software directly.
Help pages
Help page for usage:
bash SSS-test
bash local-structure-pipeline
Notice that once you run the SSS-test for the first time for any multi-FASTA file, intermediate files will be created. Therefore, the next time you run the test again for the same file, the calculation of the sss-scores will be considerably faster.
Input requirements
-
The input multi-FASTA file must to be in a subfolder of the running folder for both pipelines (SSS-test and local-structure-pipeline). If you are running the SSS-test or local.sh in $DIRECTORY, the input multi-FASTA must be located in $DIRECTORY/$SUB_FOLDER/
-
The FASTA headers should not contain space characters. It is recommended that a small name is given to each sequence, making it easy to identify each one.
Tutorial
The SSS-test and the local pipeline both require a simple multi-FASTA file as input, either pre-aligned or not aligned. The SSS-test predicts structural selection by assigning selection scores for each of the given sequences. The local pipeline calculates local structural blocks for long ncRNAs.
In this section, you will learn how to use the local pipeline and the SSS-test with examples contained in this repository. Just follow the directions below, and you will calculate selection scores for ncRNAs and lncRNA blocks and obtain images of secondary structures to analyse visually.
Usage:
bash SSS-test -i FOLDER/FILE -f FORMAT (fasta/aligned) -s STRUCTURE (Yes/No)
bash local-structure-pipeline -i FOLDER/FILE -f FORMAT (fasta/aligned) -o OUTPUT_FOLDER
In the /examples/ folder, you will find two multi-FASTA files: SIX3_AS1sub10.fa and H19X.fa. The first is a local structure block from the lncRNA SIX3-AS1 that can be submitted to the SSS-test directly. After running the SSS-test, you will obtain an output table with the selection scores and an output folder with the secondary structures of each species and respective consensus. Both outputs will be located in the input folder.
To run the SSS-test for the local block 10 of the SIX3-AS1 lncRNA, use the following command line:
bash SSS-test -i example/SIX3_AS1sub10.fa -f fasta -s Yes
You will produce an output file with the SSS-scores at: /examples/SIX3_AS1sub10.sss and an output folder at: /examples/SIX3_AS1sub10_structures/. Compare your output with the one shown in folder example/figures_for_tutorial/output1.png to make sure the software is working properly.
To measure structural selection locally in the H19X-AS1 lncRNA, you should first calculate local structure blocks and then apply the SSS-test for them. For that you can use the command lines below. The first command will create a folder: /HX19_local/ with the local structure blocks. The second applies the SSS-test to local structure 2, as an example.
bash local-structure-pipeline -i example/H19X.fa -f fasta -o H19X_local_structures
bash SSS-test -i H19X_local_structures/H19X_sub1.fasta -f fasta -s Yes
The output of the local.sh script is a folder with all local structural blocks, which can be directly submitted to the SSS-test on not aligned mode (fasta). Compare the two outputs with the ones shown in folder example/figures_for_tutorial/output2.png and output3.png to make sure the software is working properly. Pay particular attention to the scores and warning messages. If your results do not match the figures, make sure your software is correctly installed or contact the developer.
Output
The output header of SSS-test is:
sequence_ID nr_changes sp_dist sp_length alg_length score_indels score_changes sp_score family_divergence
- sequence_ID: ID of the sequence
- nr_changes: number of species specific changes. A species specific change is a base of the species that differs from the dominant base of the row, when a dominant base exists for the row. A dominant base exists when at least 60% of the bases of the row converge
- sp_dist: structural distance between the species and the consensus. Distance is calculated using the ensemble base pairing probabilities
- sp_length: length of the species
- alg_length: length of the alignment
- score_indels: indels score, calculated using the Fisher's method
- score_changes: changes score, calculated using the Fisher's method
- sp_score: species selection score, calculated summing both indel and changes score
- divergence: family's structural divergence
Reference and citation
The SSS-test and local pipeline are refered in the following publication, which contains all details on the algorithms.
If you use this test, please cite:
"SSS-test: a novel test for detecting positive selection on RNA secondary structure", Maria Beatriz Walter Costa, Christian Höner zu Siederdissen, Marko Dunjic, Peter F. Stadler and Katja Nowick. BMC Bioinformatics. 2019
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12859-019-2711-y
Contact
If you have any questions or problems, contact the developer: waltercostamb@gmail.com
Author
Maria Beatriz Walter Costa
https://github.com/waltercostamb