About the Authors

Shenghua Li

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, United States of America

Paul Brazhnik

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, United States of America

Bruno Sobral

Affiliation Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, United States of America

John J. Tyson

tyson@vt.edu

Affiliations Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, United States of America, Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: SL PB JJT. Performed the experiments: SL PB JJT. Analyzed the data: SL PB JJT. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: PB BS JJT. Wrote the paper: SL PB JJT.