The goal of BioX is to bring easy-to-use sequence analysis to Mac-using biologists. It features graphical editors for sequences and multiple alignments, and supports opening and saving of many different sequence file formats. Analysis functions currently include searching for primers, restriction sites and repeats, calculating DNA melting temperature, translation and back translation, multiple alignment and more. Please note that this is a beta release.
BioX takes advantage of the Unix underpinnings of Mac OS X by using command line sequence analysis tools from the eBiotools package (which contains software from the EMBOSS project, among others). By presenting these Unix tools in the form of a Mac application, BioX leverages the best of both worlds.
Some additional information and screenshots of BioX is available in the latest issue of EMBnet.news (Issue 2005:3, download PDF).
v1.1
- [New] BioX is now a Universal Binary.
- [New] Can create all-against-all dot plots showing similarity between sequences.
- [New] Better overview when searching for restriction sites.
- [New] Pattern search in sequences.
- [New] Shows possible feature names in feature table editor.
- [New] Includes Read Me, Release Notes, FAQ and home page links in Help menu.
- [Changed] Changed menu shortcuts and titles for better consistency.
- [Changed] Double click sequence name in an alignment to open the sequence for editing.
- [Changed] Selecting in an alignment also marks the sequence names.
- [Changed] Removed EMBOSS Launcher from the Tools menu.
- [Changed] Dropped support for Mac OS X 10.3 Panther.
- [Fixed] The last character in the file was ignored when reading fasta.
- [Fixed] The application could crash when drawing restriction sites.
- [Fixed] Error when dragging part of a sequence past the "end" of an alignment.
- [Fixed] Some other minor bugs.
