FASTA is among the most popular formats for storing biological sequence data. Here is what it is and how it is used.
The FASTA format is a text-based file format for storing protein and nucleic acid sequences. FASTA files commonly have the .fasta or .fa file extensions.
A FASTA file can contain one or more sequences. A sequence "block" in FASTA starts with a single-line description. The description line always begins with a greater-than character (>).
The sequence description line is immediately followed by the lines of sequence data. The residues in the sequence are represented using single-letter codes.
Here is an example of one protein sequence in the FASTA format:
>FER1_ARATH MASTALSSAIVSTSFLRRQQTPISLRSLPFANTQSLFGLKSSTARGGRVTAMATYKVKFI TPEGEQEVECEEDVYVLDAAEEAGLDLPYSCRAGSCSSCAGKVVSGSIDQSDQSFLDDEQ MSEGYVLTCVAYPTSDVVIETHKEEAIM
Whether you perform sequence analysis on a daily basis or only occasionally run BLAST, it is important that you are familiar with the FASTA format and can easily open FASTA file and navigate their contents.
A simple online editor for Protein Data Bank (PDB) files.
Extract protein/nucleotide sequences from PDB files.
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Create sequence logos from FASTA alignments.
Visualize the parse tree of FASTA files.
View the parse trees of Newick strings.
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Open FASTA files in the browser.
Convert AB1 files (Applied Biosystems/ABI trace files) to FASTA format.
A simple online editor for biological sequences in the FASTQ format.
An online visual editor for phylogenetic trees.
Reconstruct phylogenetic trees from protein or DNA/RNA sequence alignments.
Convert FASTQ files to FASTA format.
A simple online editor for biological sequences in the FASTA format.
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A simple online editor for phylogenetic trees in the Newick format.
Convert GenBank flat files to FASTA format.
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