Deafness mutation mining using regular expression based pattern matching

BACKGROUND: While keyword based queries of databases such as Pubmed are frequently of great utility, the ability to use regular expressions in place of a keyword can often improve the results output by such databases. Regular expressions can allow for the identification of element types that cannot be readily specified by a single keyword and can allow for different words with similar character sequences to be distinguished. RESULTS: A Perl based utility was developed to allow the use of regular expressions in Pubmed searches, thereby improving the accuracy of the searches. CONCLUSION: This utility was then utilized to create a comprehensive listing of all DFN deafness mutations discussed in Pubmed records containing the keywords "human ear".