Recipe for setup

This is a step-by-step recipe on how to set up ANSIG for a project. Parts of this depend on whether the project involves homonuclear 2D spectra only, or heteronuclear 3D/4D spectra.

Control file

Copy a control file from one of the examples, rename and edit it to fit your project.

Sequence file

Copy a sequence file from the examples, rename and edit it to put in your sequence. Note that the residue type names (Ser, Ala, Trp,...) must match the names in the dictionary. The name comparison is case-sensitive; Trp is not the same as TRP. The residue numbers (=names) can be at most 4 characters long. They do not have to be integers; letters are also allowed.

Spectrum description file

Copy a spectrum description file (spd file) from one of the examples. Choose the spd file from pgc2 if you have only 2D homonuclear spectra, or maybe also 15N-edited 3D spectra. For 3D and 4D heteronuclear spectra, the ras example spd file is probably more helpful.

It may be a good idea for a beginner to try to set things up only for one or two spectra to start with, in order to become familiar with the ANSIG program. The full set of spectra can be added later. Note that the if you are going to start picking crosspeaks, then give the spectra sensible names from the very start, since it is difficult to change spectrum names later.

Spectrum matrices

The spectrum matrices must be in ANSIG format (which is the same as Azara format). Use the various conversion programs available to reformat your spectrum matrices, if necessary.

If there is no conversion program for the specific conversion you need, then it must be written. Either one can start from the source code for the existing conversion programs to help create one's own program, or one writes a program to produce an intermediate file of the spectrum matrices in a so-called serial file (the simplest possible format), for which there is a conversion program in the distribution. Of course, this requires that one knows the format of the matrices that need to be converted.

The chemical shift referencing of spectra should be done by filling in the appropriate values in the spectrum matrix parameter files produced by the conversion programs.

Initialization file

Copy an initialization file from one of the examples. Choose the appropritate one based on which spd file you chose in the previous step.

There is no harm in keeping all the macro and AL procedure definitions in the initialization file, even if you will not use them; the space they occupy does not affect the rest of the ANSIG program. It is always easy to remove such definitions from the initialization file at a later stage.


Per Kraulis 10 Apr 1996.