From Circles to Signals: Representation Learning on Ultra-Long Extrachromosomal Circular DNA

This paper introduces eccDNAMamba, a bidirectional state space model built on the Mamba-2 framework that overcomes the limitations of existing genomic foundation models by efficiently scaling to ultra-long sequences and preserving the intrinsic circular topology of extrachromosomal circular DNA (eccDNA) to achieve superior performance in cancer-related prediction tasks.

Li, J., Liu, Z., Zhang, Z. + 2 more2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Calcium transient detection and segmentation with the astronomically motivated algorithm for background estimation and transient segmentation (Astro-BEATS)

The paper introduces Astro-BEATS, an astronomy-inspired algorithm that outperforms existing methods in detecting and segmenting subtle miniature synaptic calcium transients in fluorescence microscopy, thereby facilitating the creation of training datasets for deep learning applications.

Fan, B., Bilodeau, A., Beaupre, F. + 4 more2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

RIBEX: Predicting and Explaining RNA Binding Across Structured and Intrinsically Disordered Regions (IDR)-rich Proteins

RIBEX is a multimodal framework that integrates protein language model embeddings with graph-derived positional encodings from the human interactome to significantly improve the prediction and interpretation of RNA-binding proteins, particularly those lacking canonical domains or enriched in intrinsically disordered regions.

Firmani, S., Steinbauer, F., Kasneci, G. + 2 more2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Eco-Evolutionary Dynamics of Proliferation Heterogeneity: A Phenotype-Structured Model for Tumor Growth and Treatment Response

This study develops a phenotype-structured mathematical model to demonstrate how intra-tumor proliferation heterogeneity and life-history trade-offs drive eco-evolutionary dynamics, revealing that while all treatments slow tumor growth, they induce distinct evolutionary trajectories by selectively enriching either fast- or slow-proliferating clones depending on the specific therapeutic targeting strategy.

Schmalenstroer, L., Rockne, R. C., Farahpour, F.2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Glydentify: An explainable deep learning platform for glycosyltransferase donor substrate prediction

The authors present Glydentify, an explainable deep learning platform that accurately predicts the donor substrate specificity of glycosyltransferases by integrating protein sequence and chemical features, thereby enabling the functional characterization of uncharacterized enzymes through both computational modeling and experimental validation.

Fang, R., Na, L., Corulli, C. J. + 9 more2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Integrated Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Chemistry Approach for the Rational Design of Novel Antibacterial Agents against Ralstonia solanacearum.

This study presents an integrated artificial intelligence and quantum chemistry framework to rationally design and computationally validate "Solres," a novel antibacterial agent targeting key virulence proteins in *Ralstonia solanacearum* to combat antimicrobial resistance in agriculture.

Gulumbe, D. A., Tiwari, G., Lohar, T. + 3 more2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Single-Pass Discrete Diffusion Predicts High-Affinity Peptide Binders at >1,000 Sequences per Second across 150 Receptor Targets

LigandForge is a high-throughput discrete diffusion model that generates high-affinity peptide binders for diverse receptor targets in a single forward pass without iterative structure prediction, achieving a >10,000-fold speedup over existing methods while producing structurally diverse candidates with superior predicted binding quality.

Watson, A.2026-03-17💻 bioinformatics

Learning Universal Representations of Intermolecular Interactions with ATOMICA

The paper introduces ATOMICA, a geometric deep learning model trained on over two million complexes to generate universal, multiscale atomic representations of intermolecular interfaces across five molecular modalities, demonstrating superior performance in structure-function benchmarks and successfully predicting functional ligands for previously uncharacterized "dark" protein pockets.

Fang, A., Desgagne, M., Zhang, Z. + 4 more2026-03-16💻 bioinformatics

Metagenomic-scale analysis of the predicted protein structure universe

This study presents AFESM, a comprehensive dataset of 820 million predicted protein structures derived from AlphaFold2 and ESMfold, which reveals millions of structural clusters, uncovers novel domain folds and combinations, and highlights the critical role of metagenomic data and prediction quality in expanding our understanding of the protein structure universe.

Yeo, J., Han, Y., Bordin, N. + 8 more2026-03-16💻 bioinformatics