[Special Issue: Fact Databases and Freewares] Species-metabolite Database (KNApSAcK): Elucidating Diversity of Flavonoids

Abstract

Secondary metabolites are highly species specific and play a role for the survival of the producing organism within its natural habitat. Several databases have been made by collecting metabolite information of various organisms, and they provide some chemical information and biological pathways on metabolites, however, they don't provide the relationships between metabolites and their biological origins. To systematically and comprehensively understand species-specific diversity of metabolites, we have designed a database system called KNApSAcK. This system is useful for obtaining information on metabolites and their corresponding species, chemical structure and biological activity. The database has a tool that can be used for analyzing datasets acquired using Fourier transform ion cyclotron mass spectrometry (FT/ICR-MS). We collected information on 25,930 metabolite-species pairs encompassing 11,075 metabolites and 8,557 species from published references (January 19th, 2006). This database system and online manual are freely available at http://kanaya.naist.jp/KNApSAcK/. This database system is available in two different versions, Web-version and Download-version. If you want to use the Download-version, at the beginning, you have to install KNApSAcK and Java 1.4.2 on your local computer. The Download-version has been coded in Java.