Application for mutagenic primer design. Facilitates development of biocatalysts (Green Chemistry) and new therapeutic proteins.

This application is described in the following paper:

Mutation Maker, An Open Source Oligo Design Software For Mutagenesis and De Novo Gene Synthesis Experiments

Authors: Kaori Hiraga, Petr Mejzlik, Matej Marcisin, Nikita Vostrosablin, Anna Gromek, Jakub Arnold, Sebastian Wiewiora, Rastislav Svarba, David Prihoda, Kamila Clarova, Ondrej Klempir, Josef Navratil, Ondrej Tupa, Alejandro Vazquez-Otero, Marcin W. Walas, Lukas Holy, Martin Spale, Jakub Kotowski, David Dzamba, Gergely Temesi, Jay H. Russell, Nicholas M. Marshall, Keith A. Canada and Danny A. Bitton

Copyright© 2020 Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp. a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA.

Many useful commands are managed using the provided Makefile.

Run make help to show all available commands for building, running and deploying Mutation Maker.

First clone or download the repository from Github.
The application can be run either in multiple Docker containers with the Docker Compose tool utilizing the provided docker-compose.yml.
We also provide an example configuration when using a dedicated Ubuntu server.
For development, the application can be run locally given that all of the application dependencies are installed.

It is necessary to install Docker engine and Docker Compose tool first in order to use this installation method.
For installation instructions specific to your platform please refer to the official Docker documentation:

• Docker Engine: https://docs.docker.com/engine/install/
• Docker Compose: https://docs.docker.com/compose/install/

Mutation Maker is setup to run with docker-compose.
To start everything, simply run:

make docker-run

Or directly using:

docker-compose up --build

This will build and start all docker containers:

• Webserver: https://localhost:3000
• API: https://localhost:8000
• Frontend (live-reload or production build - see below)
• Celery worker
• Redis server
• AWS Lambda worker

You can open an interactive shell for each of the running services using (in a separate terminal):

docker-compose exec frontend sh
docker-compose exec api sh
docker-compose exec worker sh
docker-compose exec redis sh
docker-compose exec lambda sh

The docker-compose definition is stored in docker-compose.yml.

Additional details regarding the setup can be found in the respective Dockerfiles under backend, frontend, api and lambda directories.

Docker frontend container uses npm live-reload development server.
You can also execute it as a production build by changing the frontend target field in docker-compose.yml file.

Follow these steps to setup Mutation Maker in Ubuntu with root access using systemctl services.
This makes sure that all required services keep running after server restart.

1. Install required packages

   sudo apt update; sudo apt install software-properties-common;
   sudo add-apt-repository ppa:deadsnakes/ppa
   sudo apt install python3.7 python3-pip redis-server nodejs npm nginx
   # If applicable, enable nginx in ufw
   sudo ufw allow 'Nginx HTTP'
   sudo ufw status

2. Clone Mutation Maker repository

   sudo git clone https://github.com/Merck/Mutation_Maker /opt/mutationmaker
   
   cd /opt/mutationmaker
   sudo chmod -R a+rX .
   sudo -H pip3 install -r backend/requirements.txt
   sudo -H pip3 install -r api/requirements.txt

3. Adjust config files

   Use your local IP (e.g. 127.0.0.1 or where you want to bind your service):

   • for upstream-api in: frontend/resources/local-nginx-frontend.conf
   • for --bind in api/resources/gunicorn.service

4. Register and start all services

   make services

Status of all services should be displayed.
Please report any issues here.

Alternatively, all the services can be run locally in development mode using a local Python environment.

Redis is an in-memory database that serves as a task queue from the API to the Celery worker.

Install Redis using Homebrew (macOS):

brew install redis

Run Redis as a brew service:

brew services start redis

Or using:

redis-server /usr/local/etc/redis.conf

Use redis-cli flushall to clean existing task queues.

Backend dependencies are specified separately with requirements.txt under api, backend and lambda directories. It is possible to install all the dependencies under a single virtual environment.

For platform specific instructions to install Conda, please refer to the official documentation: https://docs.conda.io/projects/conda/en/latest/user-guide/install/

Create mutationmaker environment using Conda:

make conda-env

Or install the requirements directly:

pip install -r backend/requirements.txt
pip install -r api/requirements.txt
pip install -r lambda/requirements.txt

Install Node.js and NPM (macOS):

brew install node

Initialize the multi-package frontend repository and install all packages using:

make env-frontend

Or directly using:

cd frontend/
npm ci

Run all services locally using:

make run

Or run each service manually:

# Run these in separate terminals
# API
make run-api
# Frontend
make run-frontend
# Backend Celery worker
make run-worker
# AWS Lambda worker
make run-lambda
# Celery monitor (optional - only for monitoring Celery queues)
make run-monitor

• api: Server that accepts tasks from the frontend and schedules them using the backend worker.
• backend: Celery worker that processes the tasks.
• frontend: Frontend app. It contains package feature-viewer - fork of calipho-sib/feature-viewer with the following modifications:
  • added eslint and prettier and fixed/added workaround for all problems
  • added object type arrow for primer visualisation
  • added showSelectedBox and hideSelectedBox
  • removed onSelect coloring
  • added colorFeature to externally control color of features
• webserver: Main entrypoint for the user. Simple nginx proxy of requests to the application API and frontend.
• lambda: Provides AWS Lambda endpoint running Primer3 binary locally in a Docker container by SAM CLI.

More information can be found in the respective README files:

• backend: README.md (backend code customization)
• frontend: README.md
• lambda: README.md

AWS Lambda is leveraged for parallel execution of Primer3 binary. Primer3 is a command line tool to select primers for polymerase chain reaction (PCR). This option can be selected as one of the parameters in the SSSM workflow, by default it is disabled.

This AWS Lambda function can be run in three different modes of execution.

• Local deployment
• Docker deployment
• Cloud deployment

Local deployment is enabled in the application by exporting the following environment variable:

RUN_LAMBDA_LOCAL=1

To start the Lambda endpoint locally, you can run the following command:

make run-lambda

Docker deployment is enabled in the application by exporting the following environment variable:

RUN_LAMBDA_DOCKER=1

To start the Lambda endpoint in Docker container, you can run the following command:

docker-compose up lambda

It's possible to create a deployment package to AWS Lambda service in the AWS cloud using the provided Makefile commands in the lambda directory.

Please refer to the official AWS documentation for more details: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/lambda/latest/dg/python-package.html

AWS Lambda service cloud deployment is enabled in the application by exporting the following environment variables:

RUN_LAMBDA_LOCAL=0
RUN_LAMBDA_DOCKER=0
LAMBDA_FN_NAME

To use your own Lambda function in AWS, please export the function name into LAMBDA_FN_NAME environment variable. Additionally, you'll need to export the AWS Region where the function resides and the respective AWS credentials authorized to run this function.

Exporting AWS Credentials:

AWS_DEFAULT_REGION
AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY

All Mutation Maker workflows (SSSM, MSDM, PAS) are covered with unit tests of the backend features.

Basic unit test for Mutation Maker backend. These require user to specify their own sequences and mutations for testing.

Same as for Mutation Maker application however you need to run the Python interpreter with a following variable:

# Run from backend
PYTHONHASHSEED=0 python -m unittest tests/unit_tests/*

We welcome contributions from the community.

For more information check the following resources:

• Mailing list
• Reporting bugs
• Submitting changes

Bugs are tracked as GitHub issues. Please explain the problem and include additional details to help maintainers reproduce the issue. Use a clear and descriptive title for the issue to identify the problem, and describe the exact steps which reproduce the problem.

Please send a GitHub Pull Request to Mutation Maker with a clear list of what you've done. Please make sure all of your commits are atomic (one feature per commit).

Always write a clear log message for your commits. One-line messages are fine for small changes, but bigger changes should look like this:

$ git commit -m "A brief summary of the commit
> 
> A paragraph describing what changed and its impact."

Mutation Maker is licensed under GPLv3+.