| Through code written in the C programming language, this project tested whether some nucleotide sequences appear more frequently in the portions of DNA preceding a transcription start site than elsewhere. This test would indicate the regulatory sequence before the genes on the DNA strand. The positive examples were nucleotide sets up to 400 positions (base pairs) away from the beginning of known fruit fly, Drosophila, genes. Negative examples came from areas of DNA at least 2000 base pairs away from any coding region. For the samples studied in this thesis, strings of length five or shorter, there were no sequences that appeared significantly more often in the regions distant from the genetic code. This result indicated that there were not simple strings that represented regulatory sequences before the genetic code in the DNA. |
