Searching the coding region for microRNA targets

Finding microRNA targets in the coding region is difficult due to the overwhelming signal encoding the amino acid sequence. Here, we introduce an algorithm (called PACCMIT-CDS) that finds potential microRNA targets within coding sequences by searching for conserved motifs that are complementary to the microRNA seed region and also overrepresented in comparison with a background model preserving both codon usage and amino acid sequence. Precision and sensitivity of PACCMIT-CDS are evaluated using PAR-CLIP and proteomics data sets. Thanks to the properly constructed background, the new algorithm achieves a lower rate of false positives and better ranking of predictions than do currently available algorithms, which were designed to find microRNA targets within 3' UTRs.