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. 2010 Mar 30;2(2):238–244. doi: 10.4056/sigs.561626

Table 1. Examples of GO terms and their specificity metrics.

  GO Offspring      OffspN     GO Anc      GO Prop    IC
Max Specificity Value   0      9.02     31      1    15.18
Min Specificity Value   8267      0     0      0    0
GO:0005524   0      9.02     8      1    6.64
GO:0003700   1      8.33     5      0.83    5.85
GO:0042302   5      7.23     2      0.29    15.18

Note that GO Offspring is the untransformed number of offspring for a term and OffspN is the normalized metric. These GO terms provide some examples of how various metrics may provide different “views” regarding the specificity of a term. For instance GO:0005524 is the most specific by OffspN (9.02) yet is only moderate by IC (6.64), meaning that although it is most specific by the hierarchical structure of the GO, it is a relatively common term in the database. Conversely, GO:0042302 is the most specific by IC (15.18) yet is only moderately specific by OffspN which means that although more specific functions are possible according to the GO hierarchy, this term is very rare in the database. The GO:0003700 term shows relatively moderate specificity for all metrics.