What are the GeneChip® P.aeruginosa Genome Arrays and what can they be used for?

The GeneChip® P. aeruginosa Genome Array is a tool for transcriptional profiling in P .aeruginosa grown under a variety of environmental conditions. The array is also useful for assessing the consequences of perturbations, such as exposure to antimicrobial agents or effects of mutations in chromosomal genes on global RNA abundance. The array contains oligonucleotide probes selected from the annotated genome of P. aeruginosa strain PAO1 and includes 5,549 protein-coding sequences, 18 tRNA genes and a representative of the ribosomal RNA cluster. Also present on the array are probes that allow the detection of transcripts from 117 additional genes present in P. aeruginosa strains other than PAO1. Each gene is covered by approximately 13 probe pairs, with each pair consisting of a perfectly matched and a single-base mismatch probe. The probes are 25 nucleotides in length. An additional feature of the P. aeruginosa Genome Array is the presence of 199 probe sets corresponding to all intergenic regions exceeding 600 base pairs. To assure absolute specificity, the probes have been selected based on their unique sequences relative to the rest of the P. aeruginosa genome. Moreover, the selected probes have been pruned against sequence homologies in the existing database of human genes. More information about GeneChip® technology is available at www.Affymetrix.com.