Phamerator is a comparative genomics and genome exploration tool designed and written by Dr. Steve Cresawn of James Madison University.

In 2017, Phamerator transitioned from a Linux-based program to be a cross-platform web-based program. It is available at https://phamerator.org/

Phamerator requires the Ubuntu 12.04 operating system. If you are running Windows or Mac OS X, see the instructions below on how to install an emulator (like Virtual Box) with an Ubuntu virtual machine.

Native Minimum System Requirements

Ubuntu 12.04 "Precise Pangolin"

1 GHz processor

1 GB RAM

128 MB video memory

1 GB free hard-drive space

Internet connection

FULL sudo PRIVILEGES

Emulated Minimum System Requirements (using Ubuntu 12.04 virtual machine)

Windows XP/Vista/7 or at least Mac OS X 10.5

1.6 GHz x86/x64 dual-core processor

2 GB RAM

128 MB video memory

10 GB free hard-drive space

Internet connection

If you are a SEA-PHAGES member or school, you can get the SEA Virtual Machine which comes with Phamerator pre-installed. It's available here on seaphages.org.

For installation of Phamerator onto a computer already running Ubuntu 12.04, follow these instructions.

Once Phamerator is installed, you can follow the instructions in this short Quick Start Guide to start exploring phamerated maps of genomes.

Information on how to use Phamerator to assist with annotation of your phage genome can be found in section 6 of the complete DNA Master Annotation Guide.