Nanodesign

Create, interact and modify nucleic acid based structures. The Nanodesign Python Package is aimed at providing a toolkit for working with structural DNA/RNA nanotechnology designs. This package is meant to support all types of interaction with these designs, including loading Cadnano files and modifying them, building new structures from scratch, or just converting formats so you can easily visualize or simulate your design.

Getting Started

You should have git installed as well as Python 2.7. Note that this part of the guide is aimed towards Mac OS X or Linux installs. For a Windows install, a similar pattern should work using one of the command line shells.

On the command line, change to the directory you want Nanodesign installed under, and run:

git clone https://github.com/Autodesk/nanodesign

You will now have the repository cloned and checked out to the master branch in the subdirectory nanodesign/. See CONTRIBUTING.md for details on other branches.

Installation

We are currently working on getting the package set up for installation in your Python's site packages. Once this is fully tested, we'll also be adding the package to the PyPI package repository and it should no longer be necessary to acquire the git repository for regular usage.

To try out the site package install, you can run the following from the repository directory:

python setup.py install

Currently, the install should be functional for almost all of the package, except for the PDB/mmCIF export routines. The example scripts will not be installed, but you can still access them from the scripts/ subdirectory as mentioned in the examples, below.

Example Usage: Package

To do some simple operations with the package, we have a few short scripts in the examples/ subdirectory that show off the interface:

Strand Statistics

Source: examples/strand-statistics.py
This script loads a Cadnano file and produces some statistics on the number of strands by length, and the number of distinct virtual helices visited by each strand.

Find A Specific Sequence

Source: examples/seq-search.py
This script loads a Cadnano file and searches through all of the domains to find a specific DNA sequence. It will print out all domain ids that contain that sequence.

Example Usage: Scripts

There are currently three main scripts available:

converter: Converts between different formats.
stapler: Adds staples to a design following certain templates.
vis: Visualize a design. Requires PyOpenGL installed (pip install pyopengl).

For all of these, it's assumed that you are running from the scripts/ subdirectory.

Converter

For more help on the converter's options:

./converter.py --help

To convert a Cadnano design file my_sample.json into a Nanodesign Web Application viewer file, using the scaffold sequence M13mp18:

./converter.py --infile my_sample.json --informat cadnano --inseqname M13mp18 --outfile my_sample_viewer.json --outformat viewer

To convert a Cadnano design file my_sample.json into a CanDo format file, using the scaffold sequence `p8064':

./converter.py -i my_sample.json -if cadnano -isn p8064 -o my_sample.cndo -of cando

Note that we've abbreviated the option names here, using the short options.

Finally, to convert a Cadnano design file my_sample.json into a mmCIF file, using the sequence file my_sample.csv generated via Cadnano sequence export:

./converter.py -i my_sample.json -if cadnano --inseqfile my_sample.csv -o my_sample.cif -of cif

For using the complex options, like --transform, --staples, look at the test scripts found in tests/converters/ for more details.

Stapler

The stapler currently does not have a full set of arguments or help options. It takes a Cadnano file which has a single scaffold, and already has a maximal staple set in the design file. You could generate this using the converter's staple operations, or in Cadnano. The template used is one which is optimized for honeycomb lattice structures, and the timescales are such that it should run relatively quickly, but may not be the fully optimal staple set. See the comments in scripts/stapler.py for how to modify these settings.

To run the stapler on the Cadnano file my_sample.json:

./stapler.py my_sample.json

Please see the Getting Help section for a forum link should you need more assistance in using the stapler!

Visualizer

The visualizer requires PyOpenGL installed in order to run. To install PyOpenGL:

pip install pyopengl

For help on the visualizer's arguments and options:

./vis.py --help

To visualize a Cadnano file named my_sample.json, using the sequence M13mp18:

./vis.py -i my_sample.json -isn M13mp18

For more details on extra options, check out the test scripts in tests/visualizer/.

The Package

This package has several basic components:

Data Format - our internal data format for use by specific algorithms and to serve as an intermediate if needing to do format conversion. This format breaks a nanostructure down into core components: contiguous helices, nucleic acid strands, domains within a strand.
Converters - we want to be able to work with any format found in the community. Currently we support loading of Cadnano files, and writing of several different formats, including CanDo, SimDNA, Nanodesign Viewer, and more.
Algorithms - common algorithms that are used on these structures. Currently this includes melting point calculations for domains, automatic generation of staple sets for a structure, removal of staples matching certain selections, and more.

Get help

API Documentation: We currently have help docstrings for most functions and methods, and will be expanding this into a full API Docs page soon.
Forums
Email us

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for details.

Contributors

We maintain an informal list of contributors to the repository. See CONTRIBUTORS.md for a list of those who have made this possible.

Notices

See NOTICES.md for details about incorporated code and design files.

License

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.

hainm/nanodesign