MetNet Online: a novel integrated resource for plant systems biology

BACKGROUND: Plants are important as foods, pharmaceuticals, biorenewable chemicals, fuel resources, bioremediation tools and general tools for recombinant technology. The study of plant biological pathways is advanced by easy access to integrated data sources. Today, various plant data sources are scattered throughout the web, making it increasingly complicated to build comprehensive datasets. RESULTS: MetNet Online is a web-based portal that provides access to a regulatory and metabolic plant pathway database. The database and portal integrate Arabidopsis, soybean (Glycine max) and grapevine (Vitis vinifera) data. Pathways are enriched with known or predicted information on sub cellular location. MetNet Online enables pathways, interactions and entities to be browsed or searched by multiple categories such as sub cellular compartment, pathway ontology, and GO term. In addition to this, the “My MetNet” feature allows registered users to bookmark content and track, import and export customized lists of entities. Users can also construct custom networks using existing pathways and/or interactions as building blocks. CONCLUSION: The site can be reached at http://www.metnetonline.org. Extensive video tutorials on how to use the site are available through http://www.metnetonline.org/tutorial/.