Figure 1

Flowchart of SARST approaches. Three-dimensional (3D) protein structures are first transformed onto two-dimensional (2D) Ramachandran maps and then further converted into one-dimensional (1D) text strings. Thus, a structural similarity search could be performed by classical sequence similarity search methods. The Ramachandran plot shown here was generated by PROCHECK [54]. (Note that "similarity search" is more typically termed as "alignment search"; however, considering that SARST is designed as a search method rather than an alignment tool, we will use the former term throughout this report to avoid misunderstanding.)