TrypanoCyc – a metabolic pathway database for Trypanosoma brucei

Background Trypanosoma brucei (T. brucei) is a single celled parasite, subspecies of which are causative agents of African sleeping sickness in humans and nagana in domestic animals. Sleeping sickness is endemic in about 36 countries in SubSaharan Africa and is threatening over 60 million people. Disease prevention is a priority, as few effective drugs are available. Currently, there are only four drugs used as treatment: Pentamidine, Suramin. Melarsoprol and Eflornithine, though they have poor safety profiles, challenging treatment regimes and lack in efficacy. There is therefore a great need in identifying novel therapeutics for the treatment of sleeping sickness and fortunately, efforts have intensified over recent years. One such development has been the availability of the Pathway Tools Software [1]. We have used this production software to set up TrypanoCyc, a metabolic pathway database for T. brucei http://www.genedb.org/tmp/.