posted on 2023-06-07, 16:22authored byBen Sidders, Mike Withers, Sharon L Kendall, Joanna Bacon, Simon WaddellSimon Waddell, Jason Hinds, Paul Golby, Farahnaz Movahedzadeh, Robert A Cox, Rosangela Frita, Annemieke M C Ten Bokum, Lorenz Wernisch, Neil G Stoker
We describe an analysis, applicable to any spotted microarray dataset produced using genomic DNA as a reference, that quantifies prokaryotic levels of mRNA on a genome-wide scale. Applying this to Mycobacterium tuberculosis, we validate the technique, show a correlation between level of expression and biological importance, define the complement of invariant genes and analyze absolute levels of expression by functional class to develop ways of understanding an organism's biology without comparison to another growth condition.