Broken horizontal lines represent the alignment, with the most similar sequences at the top and least similar towards the bottom. Gaps indicate positions at which insertions have been made to bring equivalent parts of sequences into the correct register. Shaded areas denote regions of conservation, or motifs. Groups of motifs, or fingerprints, are excised from the alignment for iterative database scanning. The scanning algorithm interprets the motifs essentially as a series of frequency matrices - i.e. , identity searches are made, with no mutation or other similarity data to weight the results.
Diagnostic performance is enhanced by iterative database scanning.
The motifs therefore mature with each database pass, as more sequences are matched and assimilated into the process. Full potency is gained from the mutual context provided by motif neighbours, allowing sequence identification even when parts of the signature are absent. Flow diagram illustrating the iterative process used to derive and refine protein fingerprints. Rounded boxes denote programs, square boxes indicate the results of running those programs, and ellipses indicate user decisions. With the continued growth of the database, however, maintenance was becoming inefficient and error-prone.