A microcomputer program for the identification of tRNA genes.

A microcomputer program which locates tRNA genes within long DNA sequences is described. The search is performed either by identifying tRNA-like secondary structures or by locating eukaryotic RNA polymerase III promoter consensus sequences. The program is also useful in finding inverted repeats allowing the formation of stem-loop secondary structures in tRNA. The program has been developed in BASIC and 6502 Assembler and runs on the Apple II plus and IIe microcomputers. The execution is quite fast; all the operations are carried out in 1-90 s, depending on the required task and on the sequence length.