The Open REGulatory ANNOtation database (www.oreganno.org)
ORegAnno is an open database for the curation of known regulatory elements from scientific literature. Annotation is collected from users worldwide for various biological assays and is automatically cross-referenced against PubMED, Entrez Gene, EnsEMBL, dbSNP, the eVOC: Cell type ontology , and the Taxonomy database and includes information regarding the original experimentation performed (evidence). ORegAnno further provides an open validation process for all regulatory annotation in the public domain. Assigned validators receive notification of new records in the database and are able to cross-reference the citation to ensure record integrity. Validators have the ability to modify any record (deprecating the old record and creating a new one) if an error is found. Further, any contributor to the database can comment on any annotation by marking errors, or adding special reports as they see fit. These features of ORegAnno ensure that the collection is of the highest quality and uniquely provides a dynamic view of our changing understanding of gene regulation in the various genomes.
