Contact Map Explorer

Biomolecules such as proteins and DNA are polymers: they consist of individual units (sometimes called “residues”) which are connected in some order. However, the 3D structure of biomolecules does not depend entirely on the order of the residues (this is what is often called secondary and tertiary structure). As a result, understanding which residues are near which other residues is an important aspect of characterizing biomolecular systems. Contact maps are a particularly useful tool for understanding this kind of structure. They illustrate whether two residues are within some cutoff distance. I am the principal developer for Contact Map Explorer, a Python package to study contact maps.

(Note: more details on Contact Map Explorer coming soon. See its documentation for usage information)