SynTReN

SynTReN is a lightweight software application developed specifically for helping you make use of a synthetic gene expression data generator in order to be able to design and analyze structure learning algorithms. The tool can be deployed on all Windows versions out there, provided that you have the Java working platform installed on the host PC.

Needs no installation

The utility is portable so you can opt for storing it on pen drives or other portable devices in order to carry it with you all the time. Plus, you may run it without being an administrator. It can be opened directly from the storage device.
A double-click on the EXE file is all it takes in order to get access to its GUI because you do not have to follow the preset steps included in an installation process. You can get rid of it by deleting the package of files that you have downloaded from the Internet because it does not make changes to your Windows registry.

Clean design

SynTReN reveals a clean feature lineup that embeds all configuration parameters within a single window. A help manual is not available which means that you are on your own when it comes to discovering how the program works.
You are offered the possibility to make adjustments to the number of experiments, number of samples per experiment, number of nodes, number of background nodes, probability for complex two-regulator interactions, biological noise, experimental noise, noise on correlated inputs, number of external nodes, and number of correlated external nodes. In addition, you are allowed to select the subnetwork method and source network, specify the saving directory, and set the random seed.
Tests have pointed out that SynTReN needs extra time to finish some tasks, but this pretty much depends on the input parameters. It eats up CPU and memory resources so the overall performance of the computer is not hampered.

Final ideas

To sum things up, SynTReN comes packed with several handy tools for helping you generate synthetic gene expression data, and is suitable especially for professional users.