Washington University, School of Medicine, St Louis, Missouri, USA.
Homologous sequences usually have the same, or very similar, functions, so new sequences can be reliably assigned functions if homologous sequences with known functions can be identified. Homology is inferred based on sequence similarity, and many methods have been developed to identify sequences that have statistically significant similarity. This unit provides an overview of some of the basic issues in identifying similarity among sequences and points out other units in this chapter that describe specific programs that are useful for this task.