Extract text from sequence alignment files (LAV)
To convert LAV alignments to another format, you need LASTZ or other Data software.
To convert other file formats to the "DNA Sequence Alignment File" file type, you need software like LASTZ or a similar tool.
The .LAV file is a plain-text alignment format used to map the coordinates of matching DNA sequences. Originally developed by Webb Miller's group at the Miller Lab at Penn State University, it serves as the default output for the LASTZ and BLASTZ alignment programs. These tools compare massive genetic sequences, such as entire human or mouse chromosomes, to identify structural, evolutionary, and functional relationships. To view the alignments visually, bioinformaticians typically use specialized software like Laj (Local Alignment Java), GMAJ, or PipMaker.
Despite its importance in computational biology, the .LAV format has significant disadvantages. Its primary limitation is that it is strictly a coordinate map: it does not contain actual nucleotide letters (A, C, G, T). Instead, it uses a rigid, bracket-enclosed "stanza" structure to store integer coordinates that point back to the original FASTA or NIB source files. If you lose the original sequence files, the .LAV file becomes effectively useless. Furthermore, its syntax is notoriously difficult for humans to read, and it requires expensive or highly specialized software to interpret. It is completely unsupported by standard text editors or web browsers.
To make the data usable, researchers almost always need to convert .LAV files to more accessible bioinformatics formats, such as AXT, PSL, or MAF (Multiple Alignment Format). Conversion is typically handled via post-processing command-line scripts like lavToPsl or lavToAxt provided by the UCSC Genome Browser. Converting to these formats often restores the actual sequence data into the file and simplifies downstream analysis.
Because this file format is so specialized and dependent on external sequence files, standard online converters will inevitably fail to process it. If our analysis detects a supported underlying or embedded format, viewing or conversion may still be possible.
Convert.Guru analyzes your LAV file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.
Users also converted MP4, WAV, LAVS, LA1 and LQT files.
If you want to convert LAV file to MP4, AVI, MOV, WMV, FLV, WEBM, MKV, M4V, 3GP, OGV, ASF or RM, you can use LASTZ or similar software from the "DNA Sequence Data Alignment" category. In the File menu, look for Save As… or Export….
To convert MTS, MOV, RMVB, DIVX, RM, H264, TS, WMV, VOB, MP4, XVID or AVI files to LAV, try LASTZ or another comparable tool in the "DNA Sequence Data Alignment" category.
The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our LAV converter.