The development of the GPS provides the first automated research and discovery tool for the identification, parsing of genomic components, and classification of all Retroid agents in a given genome. Our approach to identifying and estimating the number of these agents is to initiate the analysis with a search for the slowest evolving protein encoded by these genomes, the RT. The Retroid genome is then identified as a function of the RT that is critical to the lifecycle of these agents. The advantage of this approach is that in one pass through a genome both closely related and highly divergent Retroid agents can be identified and assessed.
 

Click here to see a  figure describing the two stages of GPS .