Author Archives: Chris

MacVector Tip: a complex subsequence pattern example.

MacVector’s Subsequence tools allows you to search for motifs in both protein and DNA sequences. As well as a library of existing subsequence files, such as promotors and transcription factor binding sites, you can keep a library of your own subsequence matches. Subsequences libraries are multiple patterns kept in a single file. A search will […]

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Working from home and Roaming Network licenses

The pandemic brought a sudden change to usual working routines and it is probable that home working will remain part of the working week for some time to come. Most scientific research needs physical lab time, but that’s just “pipetting”! The real science also happens when you think.. and that can be done easily at […]

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MacVectorTip: Identifying, Selecting and Assembling NGS reads with a variant genotype

When analyzing/assembling/aligning NGS data, there are many scenarios where you might want to separate out the reads representing different genotypes or variant sequences. MacVector makes this very easy. Take a reference sequence and choose Analyze->Align to Reference. Now click the Add Seqs button and select and add your NGS data files. NOTE: if your reference […]

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MacVectorTip: Identifying, Selecting and Assembling NGS reads with a variant genotype

When analyzing/assembling/aligning NGS data, there are many scenarios where you might want to separate out the reads representing different genotypes or variant sequences. MacVector makes this very easy. Take a reference sequence and choose Analyze->Align to Reference. Now click the Add Seqs button and select and add your NGS data files. NOTE: if your reference […]

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MacVectorTip: Filtering NGS Data to retrieve reads matching a known sequence

So you just got your NGS reads back from that sequencing experiment and, wow, what a HUGE amount of data. Wouldn’t it be easier to handle if you could pare that down to just the gene/plasmid/sequence(s) you are interested in? MacVector to the rescue as it can read and filter fast/q files, even if they […]

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MacVectorTip: Use Bowtie to remove contaminating reads prior to NGS Assembly

MacVector with Assembler can use Velvet and/or SPAdes for fast and memory efficient de novo NGS assembly of modest sized genomes (typically up to 40 Mbp or so) even on a laptop. One common task is to assemble NGS data from BAC clones.However, one problem that often arises is that the BAC DNA preparations may […]

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Applescript: batch translation of CDS features

Apple’s AppleScript (along with Javascript for Automation) is an easy to write and easy to understand language that allows you to easily automate tasks in supported applications. Many Apple applications have a AppleScript Dictionary that defines what functions you can automate. MacVector has many such functions in its AppleScript Dictionary. You can auto annotate multiple […]

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MacVector 18.1 and the new InterProScan functional domain analysis tool

MacVector allows you to do functional domain analysis on your protein sequence using the InterProScan service. InterPro contains multiple databases of protein families, domains and motifs and InterProScan will submit a protein sequence to a search of these databases. It will also do extra analysis such as transmembrane region analysis using TMHMM and other tools.MacVector […]

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MacVectorTip: Context-sensitive Menus in MacVector

Although Apple are well known (notorious?) for always providing mice with only a single obvious button, in reality the Mac interface from early versions of MacOS all the way to macOS Big Sur, plus many Mac apps, have always used right click menus (or more accurately “context sensitive menus”) to provide extra functionality. MacVector is […]

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Make the most of your Apple Silicon Mac with MacVector 18.1

We are very pleased to announce that MacVector 18.1 is now available to download. MacVector 18.1 is a Universal Binary application, which means it runs natively on both Apple Silicon M1 Macs and Intel Macs. MacVector 18.1 matches the “Big Sur” look and feel. …and for the first time in many, many years the MacVector […]

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