Li Jianwei, Ma Wei, Zeng Pan, Wang Junyi, Geng Bin, Yang Jichun, Cui Qinghua
Brief Bioinform. 2015 Sep;16(5):806-12. doi: 10.1093/bib/bbu048. Epub 2014 Dec 17.
Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) represent a big category of noncoding RNA molecules, and increasing studies have shown that they play important roles in various critical biological processes. They show a diversity of functions through diverse mechanisms, among which regulating RNA molecules is one of the most popular ones. Given the big number of lncRNAs, it becomes urgent and important to predict the RNA targets of lncRNAs in a large scale for the comprehensive understanding of lncRNA functions and action mechanisms. Although several methods have been developed to predict RNA-RNA interactions, none of them can be used to predict the RNA targets of lncRNAs in a large scale. Here we presented a tool, LncTar, which shows the ability to efficiently predict the RNA targets of lncRNAs in a large scale. To test the accuracy of LncTar, we applied it to 10 experimentally supported lncRNA-mRNA interactions. As a result, LncTar successfully predicted 8 (80%) of the 10 lncRNA-mRNA pairs, suggesting that LncTar has a reliable accuracy. Finally, we believe that LncTar could be an efficient tool for the fast identification of the RNA targets of lncRNAs. LncTar is freely available at http://www.cuilab.cn/lnctar.
长链非编码RNA（lncRNAs）是一大类非编码RNA分子，越来越多的研究表明它们在各种关键生物学过程中发挥着重要作用。它们通过多种机制展现出多样的功能，其中调控RNA分子是最常见的机制之一。鉴于lncRNAs数量众多，为全面了解lncRNA的功能和作用机制，大规模预测lncRNAs的RNA靶标变得迫切且重要。尽管已经开发了几种方法来预测RNA-RNA相互作用，但没有一种方法可用于大规模预测lncRNAs的RNA靶标。在此，我们展示了一种工具LncTar，它能够大规模高效地预测lncRNAs的RNA靶标。为测试LncTar的准确性，我们将其应用于10对经实验支持的lncRNA- mRNA相互作用。结果，LncTar成功预测了10对lncRNA- mRNA中的8对（80%），这表明LncTar具有可靠的准确性。最后，我们相信LncTar可能是快速鉴定lncRNAs的RNA靶标的有效工具。可在http://www.cuilab.cn/lnctar免费获取LncTar。
