HNU, working together with the Suzhou Institute of Systems Medicine (ISMS) of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDC), and Sun Yat-sen University, developed a one-stop platform for early warnings of the influenza A virus – FluPhenotype. A related paperFluPhenotype-a one-stop platform for early warnings of the influenza A viruswas published on international bioinformatics journalBioinformatics.

The major authors include: Lu Congyu, postgraduate student of HNU College of Biology; Cai Zena, doctoral candidate of HNU College of Biology; Peng Yousong, associate professor of HNU College of Biology; and, Jiang Taijiao, professor of ISMS.

The FluPhenotype is a one-stop platform to rapidly determine the phenotypes of the influenza A viruses. The input of FluPhenotype is the complete or partial genomic/protein sequences of the influenza A viruses. The output presents five types of information about the viruses: 1) sequence annotation including the gene and protein names as well as the open reading frames, 2) potential hosts and human-adaptation-associated amino acid markers, 3) antigenic and genetic relationships with the vaccine strains of different HA subtypes, 4) mammalian virulence-related amino acid markers, and 5) drug resistance-related amino acid markers. FluPhenotype will be a useful bioinformatic tool for surveillance and early warnings of the newly emerging influenza A viruses. (Source:https://academic.oup.com/bioinformatics/advance-article/doi/10.1093/bioinformatics/btaa083/5734644?guestAccessKey=21482286-0b4f-4c8c-9727-9bf1a19ef4b4)