GenomeRNAi: a database for cell-based RNAi phenotypes

RNA interference (RNAi) has emerged as a powerful tool to generate loss-of-function phenotypes in a variety of organisms. Combined with the sequence information of almost completely annotated gen-omes, RNAi technologies have opened new avenues to conduct systematic genetic screens for every annotated gene in the genome. As increasing large datasets of RNAi-induced phenotypes become avail-able, an important challenge remains the systematic integration and annotation of functional informa-tion. Genome-wide RNAi screens have been perfor-med both in Caenorhabditis elegans and Drosophila for a variety of phenotypes and several RNAi libraries have become available to assess pheno-types for almost every gene in the genome. These screens were performed using different types of assays from visible phenotypes to focused trans-criptional readouts and provide a rich data source for functional annotation across different species. The GenomeRNAi database provides access to published RNAi phenotypes obtained from cell-based screens and maps them to their genomic locus, including possible non-specific regions. The database also gives access to sequence information of RNAi probes used in various screens. It can be searched by phenotype, by gene, by RNAi probe or by sequence and is accessible a