Background: Function genomic studies will generally result in lists of genes that may provide clues for exploring biological questions and discovering unanticipated functions, based on differential gene expression analysis, differential epigenomic analysis or co-expression network analysis. While tools have been developed to identify biological functions that are enriched in the genes sets, there remains a need for comprehensive tools that identify functional enrichment of genes for both model and non-model species from a different function classification perspective. Results: We developed AllEnricher, a tool that calculates gene set function enrichment, with user-defined updatable libraries backing up for both model and non-model species as well as providing comprehensive functional interpretation from multiple dimensions, including GO, KEGG, Reactome, DO and DisGeNET. Conclusions: AllEnricher incorporates up to date information from different public resources and provides a comprehensive resolution for biologists to make sense out of specific gene sets, making it an advanced open-source tool for gene set function analysis.
Flavonoids are crucial in physiological and pharmaceutical processes, especially the treatment of cancer and the prevention of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Flavonoid-producing plants and fungi have been extensively reported, but bacteria have been much less investigated as a source of flavonoid production. Deinococcus sp. 43, a spherical flavonoid-producing bacteria from the Ginkgo rhizosphere, was reported in this study. First, the whole genome of Deinococcus sp. 43 was sequenced and a series of flavonoid anabolic genes were annotated. Simultaneously, High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) results showed that Deinococcus sp. 43 was capable of producing flavonoids, with a maximum quercetin output of 2.9 mg/L. Moreover, the relative expression of key genes involved in flavonoid synthesis was determined to test the completeness of the flavonoid anabolic pathway. The results of LC-MS analysis demonstrated that the flavonoids produced by Deinococcus sp. 43 were significantly different between intracellular and extracellular environments. The concentration of multiple glycosylated flavonoids was substantially higher in extracellular than intracellular environments, while the majority of flavonoids obtained in intracellular environments were hydroxylated multiple times. Lastly, the flavonoid biosynthetic pathway of Deinococcus sp. 43 was constructed based on the genomic analysis and the detected flavonoids. In conclusion, this study represents the first comprehensive characterization of the flavonoid-producing pathway of Deinococcus. The findings demonstrate that the strain has excellent potential as a genetically engineered strain for the industrial production of flavonoids.