1
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Unger Avila P, Padvitski T, Leote AC, Chen H, Saez-Rodriguez J, Kann M, Beyer A. Gene regulatory networks in disease and ageing. Nat Rev Nephrol 2024; 20:616-633. [PMID: 38867109 DOI: 10.1038/s41581-024-00849-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 05/15/2024] [Indexed: 06/14/2024]
Abstract
The precise control of gene expression is required for the maintenance of cellular homeostasis and proper cellular function, and the declining control of gene expression with age is considered a major contributor to age-associated changes in cellular physiology and disease. The coordination of gene expression can be represented through models of the molecular interactions that govern gene expression levels, so-called gene regulatory networks. Gene regulatory networks can represent interactions that occur through signal transduction, those that involve regulatory transcription factors, or statistical models of gene-gene relationships based on the premise that certain sets of genes tend to be coexpressed across a range of conditions and cell types. Advances in experimental and computational technologies have enabled the inference of these networks on an unprecedented scale and at unprecedented precision. Here, we delineate different types of gene regulatory networks and their cell-biological interpretation. We describe methods for inferring such networks from large-scale, multi-omics datasets and present applications that have aided our understanding of cellular ageing and disease mechanisms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Paula Unger Avila
- Cluster of Excellence on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD), University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - Tsimafei Padvitski
- Cluster of Excellence on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD), University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - Ana Carolina Leote
- Cluster of Excellence on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD), University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - He Chen
- Cluster of Excellence on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD), University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
- Department II of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - Julio Saez-Rodriguez
- Faculty of Medicine and Heidelberg University Hospital, Institute for Computational Biomedicine, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Martin Kann
- Department II of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
- Center for Molecular Medicine Cologne, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - Andreas Beyer
- Cluster of Excellence on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD), University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
- Center for Molecular Medicine Cologne, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
- Institute for Genetics, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
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2
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Moeckel C, Mouratidis I, Chantzi N, Uzun Y, Georgakopoulos-Soares I. Advances in computational and experimental approaches for deciphering transcriptional regulatory networks: Understanding the roles of cis-regulatory elements is essential, and recent research utilizing MPRAs, STARR-seq, CRISPR-Cas9, and machine learning has yielded valuable insights. Bioessays 2024; 46:e2300210. [PMID: 38715516 DOI: 10.1002/bies.202300210] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/31/2023] [Revised: 04/22/2024] [Accepted: 04/23/2024] [Indexed: 05/16/2024]
Abstract
Understanding the influence of cis-regulatory elements on gene regulation poses numerous challenges given complexities stemming from variations in transcription factor (TF) binding, chromatin accessibility, structural constraints, and cell-type differences. This review discusses the role of gene regulatory networks in enhancing understanding of transcriptional regulation and covers construction methods ranging from expression-based approaches to supervised machine learning. Additionally, key experimental methods, including MPRAs and CRISPR-Cas9-based screening, which have significantly contributed to understanding TF binding preferences and cis-regulatory element functions, are explored. Lastly, the potential of machine learning and artificial intelligence to unravel cis-regulatory logic is analyzed. These computational advances have far-reaching implications for precision medicine, therapeutic target discovery, and the study of genetic variations in health and disease.
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Affiliation(s)
- Camille Moeckel
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Institute for Personalized Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Ioannis Mouratidis
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Institute for Personalized Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
- Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Nikol Chantzi
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Institute for Personalized Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Yasin Uzun
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Institute for Personalized Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
- Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
- Department of Pediatrics, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Ilias Georgakopoulos-Soares
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Institute for Personalized Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA
- Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
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3
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Zhou S, Abdihamid O, Tan F, Zhou H, Liu H, Li Z, Xiao S, Li B. KIT mutations and expression: current knowledge and new insights for overcoming IM resistance in GIST. Cell Commun Signal 2024; 22:153. [PMID: 38414063 PMCID: PMC10898159 DOI: 10.1186/s12964-023-01411-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2023] [Accepted: 11/25/2023] [Indexed: 02/29/2024] Open
Abstract
Gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST) is the most common sarcoma located in gastrointestinal tract and derived from the interstitial cell of Cajal (ICC) lineage. Both ICC and GIST cells highly rely on KIT signal pathway. Clinically, about 80-90% of treatment-naive GIST patients harbor primary KIT mutations, and special KIT-targeted TKI, imatinib (IM) showing dramatic efficacy but resistance invariably occur, 90% of them was due to the second resistance mutations emerging within the KIT gene. Although there are multiple variants of KIT mutant which did not show complete uniform biologic characteristics, most of them have high KIT expression level. Notably, the high expression level of KIT gene is not correlated to its gene amplification. Recently, accumulating evidences strongly indicated that the gene coding, epigenetic regulation, and pre- or post- protein translation of KIT mutants in GIST were quite different from that of wild type (WT) KIT. In this review, we elucidate the biologic mechanism of KIT variants and update the underlying mechanism of the expression of KIT gene, which are exclusively regulated in GIST, providing a promising yet evidence-based therapeutic landscape and possible target for the conquer of IM resistance. Video Abstract.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shishan Zhou
- Division of Oncology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China, Xiangya road 87
| | - Omar Abdihamid
- Garissa Cancer Center, Garissa County Referral Hospital, Kismayu road, Garissa town, P.O BOX, 29-70100, Kenya
| | - Fengbo Tan
- Division of Surgery, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, China, Hunan, Changsha
| | - Haiyan Zhou
- Division of Pathology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China
| | - Heli Liu
- Division of Surgery, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, China, Hunan, Changsha
| | - Zhi Li
- Center for Molecular Medicine of Xiangya Hospital, Collaborative Innovation Center for Cancer Medicine, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China, 410008
| | - Sheng Xiao
- Department of Pathology, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, 410008, MA, USA
| | - Bin Li
- Division of Oncology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China, Xiangya road 87#.
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4
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Arriojas A, Patalano S, Macoska J, Zarringhalam K. A Bayesian noisy logic model for inference of transcription factor activity from single cell and bulk transcriptomic data. NAR Genom Bioinform 2023; 5:lqad106. [PMID: 38094309 PMCID: PMC10716740 DOI: 10.1093/nargab/lqad106] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/07/2023] [Revised: 11/12/2023] [Accepted: 11/24/2023] [Indexed: 12/20/2023] Open
Abstract
The advent of high-throughput sequencing has made it possible to measure the expression of genes at relatively low cost. However, direct measurement of regulatory mechanisms, such as transcription factor (TF) activity is still not readily feasible in a high-throughput manner. Consequently, there is a need for computational approaches that can reliably estimate regulator activity from observable gene expression data. In this work, we present a noisy Boolean logic Bayesian model for TF activity inference from differential gene expression data and causal graphs. Our approach provides a flexible framework to incorporate biologically motivated TF-gene regulation logic models. Using simulations and controlled over-expression experiments in cell cultures, we demonstrate that our method can accurately identify TF activity. Moreover, we apply our method to bulk and single cell transcriptomics measurements to investigate transcriptional regulation of fibroblast phenotypic plasticity. Finally, to facilitate usage, we provide user-friendly software packages and a web-interface to query TF activity from user input differential gene expression data: https://umbibio.math.umb.edu/nlbayes/.
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Affiliation(s)
- Argenis Arriojas
- Department of Mathematics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Department of Physics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Susan Patalano
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Jill Macoska
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Kourosh Zarringhalam
- Department of Mathematics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
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5
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Russell M, Aqil A, Saitou M, Gokcumen O, Masuda N. Gene communities in co-expression networks across different tissues. PLoS Comput Biol 2023; 19:e1011616. [PMID: 37976327 PMCID: PMC10691702 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011616] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/19/2023] [Revised: 12/01/2023] [Accepted: 10/19/2023] [Indexed: 11/19/2023] Open
Abstract
With the recent availability of tissue-specific gene expression data, e.g., provided by the GTEx Consortium, there is interest in comparing gene co-expression patterns across tissues. One promising approach to this problem is to use a multilayer network analysis framework and perform multilayer community detection. Communities in gene co-expression networks reveal groups of genes similarly expressed across individuals, potentially involved in related biological processes responding to specific environmental stimuli or sharing common regulatory variations. We construct a multilayer network in which each of the four layers is an exocrine gland tissue-specific gene co-expression network. We develop methods for multilayer community detection with correlation matrix input and an appropriate null model. Our correlation matrix input method identifies five groups of genes that are similarly co-expressed in multiple tissues (a community that spans multiple layers, which we call a generalist community) and two groups of genes that are co-expressed in just one tissue (a community that lies primarily within just one layer, which we call a specialist community). We further found gene co-expression communities where the genes physically cluster across the genome significantly more than expected by chance (on chromosomes 1 and 11). This clustering hints at underlying regulatory elements determining similar expression patterns across individuals and cell types. We suggest that KRTAP3-1, KRTAP3-3, and KRTAP3-5 share regulatory elements in skin and pancreas. Furthermore, we find that CELA3A and CELA3B share associated expression quantitative trait loci in the pancreas. The results indicate that our multilayer community detection method for correlation matrix input extracts biologically interesting communities of genes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Madison Russell
- Department of Mathematics, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York, United States of America
| | - Alber Aqil
- Department of Biological Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York, United States of America
| | - Marie Saitou
- Faculty of Biosciences, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås, Norway
| | - Omer Gokcumen
- Department of Biological Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York, United States of America
| | - Naoki Masuda
- Department of Mathematics, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York, United States of America
- Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Data Science, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York, United States of America
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6
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Cuevas-Zuviría B, Fer E, Adam ZR, Kaçar B. The modular biochemical reaction network structure of cellular translation. NPJ Syst Biol Appl 2023; 9:52. [PMID: 37884541 PMCID: PMC10603163 DOI: 10.1038/s41540-023-00315-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/11/2023] [Accepted: 10/12/2023] [Indexed: 10/28/2023] Open
Abstract
Translation is an essential attribute of all living cells. At the heart of cellular operation, it is a chemical information decoding process that begins with an input string of nucleotides and ends with the synthesis of a specific output string of peptides. The translation process is interconnected with gene expression, physiological regulation, transcription, and responses to signaling molecules, among other cellular functions. Foundational efforts have uncovered a wealth of knowledge about the mechanistic functions of the components of translation and their many interactions between them, but the broader biochemical connections between translation, metabolism and polymer biosynthesis that enable translation to occur have not been comprehensively mapped. Here we present a multilayer graph of biochemical reactions describing the translation, polymer biosynthesis and metabolism networks of an Escherichia coli cell. Intriguingly, the compounds that compose these three layers are distinctly aggregated into three modes regardless of their layer categorization. Multimodal mass distributions are well-known in ecosystems, but this is the first such distribution reported at the biochemical level. The degree distributions of the translation and metabolic networks are each likely to be heavy-tailed, but the polymer biosynthesis network is not. A multimodal mass-degree distribution indicates that the translation and metabolism networks are each distinct, adaptive biochemical modules, and that the gaps between the modes reflect evolved responses to the functional use of metabolite, polypeptide and polynucleotide compounds. The chemical reaction network of cellular translation opens new avenues for exploring complex adaptive phenomena such as percolation and phase changes in biochemical contexts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bruno Cuevas-Zuviría
- Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
- Centro de Biotecnología y Genómica de Plantas, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM), Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Tecnología Agraria y Alimentaria (INIA-CSIC), Madrid, Spain
| | - Evrim Fer
- Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
- Microbiology Doctoral Training Program, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
| | - Zachary R Adam
- Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
- Department of Geosciences, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
| | - Betül Kaçar
- Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA.
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7
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Kim D, Tran A, Kim HJ, Lin Y, Yang JYH, Yang P. Gene regulatory network reconstruction: harnessing the power of single-cell multi-omic data. NPJ Syst Biol Appl 2023; 9:51. [PMID: 37857632 PMCID: PMC10587078 DOI: 10.1038/s41540-023-00312-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2023] [Accepted: 10/02/2023] [Indexed: 10/21/2023] Open
Abstract
Inferring gene regulatory networks (GRNs) is a fundamental challenge in biology that aims to unravel the complex relationships between genes and their regulators. Deciphering these networks plays a critical role in understanding the underlying regulatory crosstalk that drives many cellular processes and diseases. Recent advances in sequencing technology have led to the development of state-of-the-art GRN inference methods that exploit matched single-cell multi-omic data. By employing diverse mathematical and statistical methodologies, these methods aim to reconstruct more comprehensive and precise gene regulatory networks. In this review, we give a brief overview on the statistical and methodological foundations commonly used in GRN inference methods. We then compare and contrast the latest state-of-the-art GRN inference methods for single-cell matched multi-omics data, and discuss their assumptions, limitations and opportunities. Finally, we discuss the challenges and future directions that hold promise for further advancements in this rapidly developing field.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Kim
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Computational Systems Biology Unit, Children's Medical Research Institute, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
| | - Andy Tran
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
| | - Hani Jieun Kim
- Computational Systems Biology Unit, Children's Medical Research Institute, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
| | - Yingxin Lin
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
- Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
| | - Jean Yee Hwa Yang
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
- Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
| | - Pengyi Yang
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
- Computational Systems Biology Unit, Children's Medical Research Institute, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
- Sydney Precision Data Science Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
- Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
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8
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Rommasi F. Identification, characterization, and prognosis investigation of pivotal genes shared in different stages of breast cancer. Sci Rep 2023; 13:8447. [PMID: 37231064 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-35318-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/17/2023] [Accepted: 05/16/2023] [Indexed: 05/27/2023] Open
Abstract
One of the leading causes of death (20.1 per 100,000 women per year), breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer in females. Statistically, 95% of breast cancer are categorized as adenocarcinomas, and 55% of all patients may go into invasive phases; however, it can be successfully treated in approximately 70-80% of cases if diagnosed in the nascent stages. The emergence of breast tumor cells which are intensely resistant to conventional therapies, along with the high rate of metastasis occurrence, has highlighted the importance of finding novel strategies and treatments. One of the most advantageous schemes to alleviate this complication is to identify the common differentially expressed genes (DEGs) among primary and metastatic cancerous cells to use resultants for designing new therapeutic agents which are able to target both primary and metastatic breast tumor cells. In this study, the gene expression dataset with accession number GSE55715 was analyzed containing two primary tumor samples, three bone-metastatic samples, and three normal samples to distinguish the up- and down regulated genes in each stage compared to normal cells as control. In the next step, the common upregulated genes between the two experimental groups were detected by Venny online tool. Moreover, gene ontology, functions and pathways, gene-targeting microRNA, and influential metabolites were determined using EnrichR 2021 GO, KEGG pathways miRTarbase 2017, and HMDB 2021, respectively. Furthermore, elicited from STRING protein-protein interaction networks were imported to Cytoscape software to identify the hub genes. Then, identified hub genes were checked to validate the study using oncological databases. The results of the present article disclosed 1263 critical common DEGs (573 upregulated + 690 downregulated), including 35 hub genes that can be broadly used as new targets for cancer treatment and as biomarkers for cancer detection by evaluation of expression level. Besides, this study opens a new horizon to reveal unknown aspects of cancer signaling pathways by providing raw data evoked from in silico experiments. This study's outcomes can also be widely utilized in further lab research since it contains diverse information on common DEGs of varied stages and metastases of breast cancer, their functions, structures, interactions, and associations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Foad Rommasi
- Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran.
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9
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Warren EB, Gordon-Lipkin EM, Cheung F, Chen J, Mukherjee A, Apps R, Tsang JS, Jetmore J, Schlein ML, Kruk S, Lei Y, West AP, McGuire PJ. Inflammatory and interferon gene expression signatures in patients with mitochondrial disease. J Transl Med 2023; 21:331. [PMID: 37208779 DOI: 10.1186/s12967-023-04180-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/21/2023] [Accepted: 05/04/2023] [Indexed: 05/21/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND People with mitochondrial disease (MtD) are susceptible to metabolic decompensation and neurological symptom progression in response to an infection. Increasing evidence suggests that mitochondrial dysfunction may cause chronic inflammation, which may promote hyper-responsiveness to pathogens and neurodegeneration. We sought to examine transcriptional changes between MtD patients and healthy controls to identify common gene signatures of immune dysregulation in MtD. METHODS We collected whole blood from a cohort of MtD patients and healthy controls and performed RNAseq to examine transcriptomic differences. We performed GSEA analyses to compare our findings against existing studies to identify commonly dysregulated pathways. RESULTS Gene sets involved in inflammatory signaling, including type I interferons, interleukin-1β and antiviral responses, are enriched in MtD patients compared to controls. Monocyte and dendritic cell gene clusters are also enriched in MtD patients, while T cell and B cell gene sets are negatively enriched. The enrichment of antiviral response corresponds with an independent set of MELAS patients, and two mouse models of mtDNA dysfunction. CONCLUSIONS Through the convergence of our results, we demonstrate translational evidence of systemic peripheral inflammation arising from MtD, predominantly through antiviral response gene sets. This provides key evidence linking mitochondrial dysfunction to inflammation, which may contribute to the pathogenesis of primary MtD and other chronic inflammatory disorders associated with mitochondrial dysfunction.
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Affiliation(s)
- Emily B Warren
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Eliza M Gordon-Lipkin
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Foo Cheung
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Jinguo Chen
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Amrita Mukherjee
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Richard Apps
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - John S Tsang
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
- Department of Immunobiology, School of Medicine, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
| | - Jillian Jetmore
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Melissa L Schlein
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Shannon Kruk
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Yuanjiu Lei
- Department of Microbial Pathogenesis & Immunology, Texas A&M University, Bryan, TX, USA
| | - A Phillip West
- Department of Microbial Pathogenesis & Immunology, Texas A&M University, Bryan, TX, USA.
| | - Peter J McGuire
- Metabolism, Infection and Immunity Section, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.
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10
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Arriojas A, Patalano S, Macoska J, Zarringhalam K. A Bayesian Noisy Logic Model for Inference of Transcription Factor Activity from Single Cell and Bulk Transcriptomic Data. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2023:2023.05.03.539308. [PMID: 37205561 PMCID: PMC10187261 DOI: 10.1101/2023.05.03.539308] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/21/2023]
Abstract
The advent of high-throughput sequencing has made it possible to measure the expression of genes at relatively low cost. However, direct measurement of regulatory mechanisms, such as Transcription Factor (TF) activity is still not readily feasible in a high-throughput manner. Consequently, there is a need for computational approaches that can reliably estimate regulator activity from observable gene expression data. In this work, we present a noisy Boolean logic Bayesian model for TF activity inference from differential gene expression data and causal graphs. Our approach provides a flexible framework to incorporate biologically motivated TF-gene regulation logic models. Using simulations and controlled over-expression experiments in cell cultures, we demonstrate that our method can accurately identify TF activity. Moreover, we apply our method to bulk and single cell transcriptomics measurements to investigate transcriptional regulation of fibroblast phenotypic plasticity. Finally, to facilitate usage, we provide user-friendly software packages and a web-interface to query TF activity from user input differential gene expression data: https://umbibio.math.umb.edu/nlbayes/.
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Affiliation(s)
- Argenis Arriojas
- Department of Mathematics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Department of Physics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Susan Patalano
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Jill Macoska
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
| | - Kourosh Zarringhalam
- Department of Mathematics, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
- Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA 02125, USA
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11
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Warren E, Gordon-Lipkin EM, Cheung F, Chen J, Mukherjee A, Apps R, Tsang JS, Jetmore J, Kruk S, Lei Y, West AP, McGuire PJ. Inflammatory and interferon gene expression signatures in patients with mitochondrial disease. RESEARCH SQUARE 2023:rs.3.rs-2612547. [PMID: 36909538 PMCID: PMC10002836 DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-2612547/v1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/03/2023]
Abstract
Background: People with mitochondrial disease (MtD) are susceptible to metabolic decompensation and neurological symptom progression in response to an infection. Increasing evidence suggests that mitochondrial dysfunction may cause chronic inflammation, which may promote hyperresponsiveness to pathogens and neurodegeneration. Methods: We collected whole blood from a cohort of MtD patients and healthy controls and performed RNAseq to examine transcriptomic differences. We performed GSEA analyses to compare our findings against existing studies to identify commonly dysregulated pathways. Results: Gene sets involved in inflammatory signaling, including type I interferons, interleukin-1β and antiviral responses, are enriched in MtD patients compared to controls. Monocyte and dendritic cell gene clusters are also enriched in MtD patients, while T cell and B cell gene sets are negatively enriched. The enrichment of antiviral response corresponds with an independent set of MELAS patients, and two mouse models of mtDNA dysfunction. Conclusions: Through the convergence of our results, we demonstrate translational evidence of systemic peripheral inflammation arising from MtD, predominantly through antiviral response gene sets. This provides key evidence linking mitochondrial dysfunction to inflammation, which may contribute to the pathogenesis of primary MtD and other chronic inflammatory disorders associated with mitochondrial dysfunction.
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12
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Najnin T, Saimon SH, Sunter G, Ruan J. A Network-Based Approach for Improving Annotation of Transcription Factor Functions and Binding Sites in Arabidopsis thaliana. Genes (Basel) 2023; 14:genes14020282. [PMID: 36833209 PMCID: PMC9957447 DOI: 10.3390/genes14020282] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/09/2022] [Revised: 01/12/2023] [Accepted: 01/19/2023] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
Transcription factors are an integral component of the cellular machinery responsible for regulating many biological processes, and they recognize distinct DNA sequence patterns as well as internal/external signals to mediate target gene expression. The functional roles of an individual transcription factor can be traced back to the functions of its target genes. While such functional associations can be inferred through the use of binding evidence from high-throughput sequencing technologies available today, including chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing, such experiments can be resource-consuming. On the other hand, exploratory analysis driven by computational techniques can alleviate this burden by narrowing the search scope, but the results are often deemed low-quality or non-specific by biologists. In this paper, we introduce a data-driven, statistics-based strategy to predict novel functional associations for transcription factors in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. To achieve this, we leverage one of the largest available gene expression compendia to build a genome-wide transcriptional regulatory network and infer regulatory relationships among transcription factors and their targets. We then use this network to build a pool of likely downstream targets for each transcription factor and query each target pool for functionally enriched gene ontology terms. The results exhibited sufficient statistical significance to annotate most of the transcription factors in Arabidopsis with highly specific biological processes. We also perform DNA binding motif discovery for transcription factors based on their target pool. We show that the predicted functions and motifs strongly agree with curated databases constructed from experimental evidence. In addition, statistical analysis of the network revealed interesting patterns and connections between network topology and system-level transcriptional regulation properties. We believe that the methods demonstrated in this work can be extended to other species to improve the annotation of transcription factors and understand transcriptional regulation on a system level.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tanzira Najnin
- Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA
| | - Sakhawat Hossain Saimon
- Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA
| | - Garry Sunter
- Department of Biological Sciences, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA
| | - Jianhua Ruan
- Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA
- Correspondence:
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13
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Cheung F, Apps R, Dropulic L, Kotliarov Y, Chen J, Jordan T, Langweiler M, Candia J, Biancotto A, Han KL, Rachmaninoff N, Pietz H, Wang K, Tsang JS, Cohen JI. Sex and prior exposure jointly shape innate immune responses to a live herpesvirus vaccine. eLife 2023; 12:80652. [PMID: 36648132 PMCID: PMC9844983 DOI: 10.7554/elife.80652] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/29/2022] [Accepted: 12/02/2022] [Indexed: 01/11/2023] Open
Abstract
Background Both sex and prior exposure to pathogens are known to influence responses to immune challenges, but their combined effects are not well established in humans, particularly in early innate responses critical for shaping subsequent outcomes. Methods We employed systems immunology approaches to study responses to a replication-defective, herpes simplex virus (HSV) 2 vaccine in men and women either naive or previously exposed to HSV. Results Blood transcriptomic and cell population profiling showed substantial changes on day 1 after vaccination, but the responses depended on sex and whether the vaccinee was naive or previously exposed to HSV. The magnitude of early transcriptional responses was greatest in HSV naive women where type I interferon (IFN) signatures were prominent and associated negatively with vaccine-induced neutralizing antibody titers, suggesting that a strong early antiviral response reduced the uptake of this replication-defective virus vaccine. While HSV seronegative vaccine recipients had upregulation of gene sets in type I IFN (IFN-α/β) responses, HSV2 seropositive vaccine recipients tended to have responses focused more on type II IFN (IFN-γ) genes. Conclusions These results together show that prior exposure and sex interact to shape early innate responses that then impact subsequent adaptive immune phenotypes. Funding Intramural Research Program of the NIH, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and other institutes supporting the Trans-NIH Center for Human Immunology, Autoimmunity, and Inflammation. The vaccine trial was supported through a clinical trial agreement between the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and Sanofi Pasteur. Clinical trial number: NCT01915212.
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Affiliation(s)
- Foo Cheung
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Richard Apps
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Lesia Dropulic
- Medical Virology Section, Laboratory of Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Yuri Kotliarov
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Jinguo Chen
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Tristan Jordan
- Medical Virology Section, Laboratory of Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Marc Langweiler
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Julian Candia
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Angelique Biancotto
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Kyu Lee Han
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Nicholas Rachmaninoff
- Multiscale Systems Biology Section, Laboratory of Immune System Biology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Harlan Pietz
- Medical Virology Section, Laboratory of Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Kening Wang
- Medical Virology Section, Laboratory of Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - John S Tsang
- Center for Human Immunology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
- Multiscale Systems Biology Section, Laboratory of Immune System Biology, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
| | - Jeffrey I Cohen
- Medical Virology Section, Laboratory of Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaUnited States
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14
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Pardo-Diaz J, Poole PS, Beguerisse-Díaz M, Deane CM, Reinert G. Generating weighted and thresholded gene coexpression networks using signed distance correlation. NETWORK SCIENCE (CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS) 2022; 10:131-145. [PMID: 36217370 PMCID: PMC7613200 DOI: 10.1017/nws.2022.13] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/16/2023]
Abstract
Even within well-studied organisms, many genes lack useful functional annotations. One way to generate such functional information is to infer biological relationships between genes or proteins, using a network of gene coexpression data that includes functional annotations. Signed distance correlation has proved useful for the construction of unweighted gene coexpression networks. However, transforming correlation values into unweighted networks may lead to a loss of important biological information related to the intensity of the correlation. Here we introduce a principled method to construct weighted gene coexpression networks using signed distance correlation. These networks contain weighted edges only between those pairs of genes whose correlation value is higher than a given threshold. We analyse data from different organisms and find that networks generated with our method based on signed distance correlation are more stable and capture more biological information compared to networks obtained from Pearson correlation. Moreover, we show that signed distance correlation networks capture more biological information than unweighted networks based on the same metric. While we use biological data sets to illustrate the method, the approach is general and can be used to construct networks in other domains. Code and data are available on https://github.com/javier-pardodiaz/sdcorGCN.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Philip S Poole
- Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3RB, UK
| | | | | | - Gesine Reinert
- Department of Statistics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3LB, UK
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15
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Saint-André V. Computational biology approaches for mapping transcriptional regulatory networks. Comput Struct Biotechnol J 2021; 19:4884-4895. [PMID: 34522292 PMCID: PMC8426465 DOI: 10.1016/j.csbj.2021.08.028] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/24/2021] [Revised: 08/16/2021] [Accepted: 08/16/2021] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Transcriptional Regulatory Networks (TRNs) are mainly responsible for the cell-type- or cell-state-specific expression of gene sets from the same DNA sequence. However, so far there are no precise maps of TRNs available for each cell-type or cell-state, and no ideal tool to map those networks clearly and in full from biological samples. In this review, major approaches and tools to map TRNs from high-throughput data are presented, depending on the type of methods or data used to infer them, and their advantages and limitations are discussed. After summarizing the main principles defining the topology and structure–function relationships in TRNs, an overview of the extensive work done to map TRNs from bulk transcriptomic data will be presented by type of methodological approach. Most recent modellings of TRNs using other types of molecular data or integrating different data types, including single-cell RNA-sequencing and chromatin information, will then be discussed, before briefly concluding with improvements expected to come in the field.
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Affiliation(s)
- Violaine Saint-André
- Hub de Bioinformatique et Biostatistique - Département Biologie Computationnelle, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France
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16
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Pardo-Diaz J, Bozhilova LV, Beguerisse-Díaz M, Poole PS, Deane CM, Reinert G. Robust gene coexpression networks using signed distance correlation. Bioinformatics 2021; 37:1982–1989. [PMID: 33523234 PMCID: PMC8557847 DOI: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btab041] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/24/2020] [Revised: 11/30/2020] [Accepted: 01/21/2021] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
MOTIVATION Even within well studied organisms, many genes lack useful functional annotations. One way to generate such functional information is to infer biological relationships between genes/proteins, using a network of gene coexpression data that includes functional annotations. However, the lack of trustworthy functional annotations can impede the validation of such networks. Hence, there is a need for a principled method to construct gene coexpression networks that capture biological information and are structurally stable even in the absence of functional information. RESULTS We introduce the concept of signed distance correlation as a measure of dependency between two variables, and apply it to generate gene coexpression networks. Distance correlation offers a more intuitive approach to network construction than commonly used methods such as Pearson correlation and mutual information. We propose a framework to generate self-consistent networks using signed distance correlation purely from gene expression data, with no additional information. We analyse data from three different organisms to illustrate how networks generated with our method are more stable and capture more biological information compared to networks obtained from Pearson correlation or mutual information. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION Supplementary Information and code are available at Bioinformatics and https://github.com/javier-pardodiaz/sdcorGCN online.
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Affiliation(s)
- Javier Pardo-Diaz
- Department of Statistics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3LB, UK
- Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3RB, UK
| | | | | | - Philip S Poole
- Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3RB, UK
| | | | - Gesine Reinert
- Department of Statistics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3LB, UK
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17
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Buchberger E, Bilen A, Ayaz S, Salamanca D, Matas de las Heras C, Niksic A, Almudi I, Torres-Oliva M, Casares F, Posnien N. Variation in Pleiotropic Hub Gene Expression Is Associated with Interspecific Differences in Head Shape and Eye Size in Drosophila. Mol Biol Evol 2021; 38:1924-1942. [PMID: 33386848 PMCID: PMC8097299 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msaa335] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/26/2022] Open
Abstract
Revealing the mechanisms underlying the breathtaking morphological diversity observed in nature is a major challenge in Biology. It has been established that recurrent mutations in hotspot genes cause the repeated evolution of morphological traits, such as body pigmentation or the gain and loss of structures. To date, however, it remains elusive whether hotspot genes contribute to natural variation in the size and shape of organs. As natural variation in head morphology is pervasive in Drosophila, we studied the molecular and developmental basis of differences in compound eye size and head shape in two closely related Drosophila species. We show differences in the progression of retinal differentiation between species and we applied comparative transcriptomics and chromatin accessibility data to identify the GATA transcription factor Pannier (Pnr) as central factor associated with these differences. Although the genetic manipulation of Pnr affected multiple aspects of dorsal head development, the effect of natural variation is restricted to a subset of the phenotypic space. We present data suggesting that this developmental constraint is caused by the coevolution of expression of pnr and its cofactor u-shaped (ush). We propose that natural variation in expression or function of highly connected developmental regulators with pleiotropic functions is a major driver for morphological evolution and we discuss implications on gene regulatory network evolution. In comparison to previous findings, our data strongly suggest that evolutionary hotspots are not the only contributors to the repeated evolution of eye size and head shape in Drosophila.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elisa Buchberger
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Anıl Bilen
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Sanem Ayaz
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - David Salamanca
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
- Present address: Department of Integrative Zoology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
| | | | - Armin Niksic
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Isabel Almudi
- CABD (CSIC/UPO/JA), DMC2 Unit, Pablo de Olavide University Campus, Seville, Spain
| | - Montserrat Torres-Oliva
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
- Present address: Institute of Clinical Molecular Biology, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein, Kiel, Germany
| | - Fernando Casares
- CABD (CSIC/UPO/JA), DMC2 Unit, Pablo de Olavide University Campus, Seville, Spain
| | - Nico Posnien
- Department of Developmental Biology, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
- Corresponding author: E-mail:
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18
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Jaeger J, Monk N. Dynamical modules in metabolism, cell and developmental biology. Interface Focus 2021; 11:20210011. [PMID: 34055307 PMCID: PMC8086940 DOI: 10.1098/rsfs.2021.0011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 03/10/2021] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Modularity is an essential feature of any adaptive complex system. Phenotypic traits are modules in the sense that they have a distinguishable structure or function, which can vary (quasi-)independently from its context. Since all phenotypic traits are the product of some underlying regulatory dynamics, the generative processes that constitute the genotype-phenotype map must also be functionally modular. Traditionally, modular processes have been identified as structural modules in regulatory networks. However, structure only constrains, but does not determine, the dynamics of a process. Here, we propose an alternative approach that decomposes the behaviour of a complex regulatory system into elementary activity-functions. Modular activities can occur in networks that show no structural modularity, making dynamical modularity more widely applicable than structural decomposition. Furthermore, the behaviour of a regulatory system closely mirrors its functional contribution to the outcome of a process, which makes dynamical modularity particularly suited for functional decomposition. We illustrate our approach with numerous examples from the study of metabolism, cellular processes, as well as development and pattern formation. We argue that dynamical modules provide a shared conceptual foundation for developmental and evolutionary biology, and serve as the foundation for a new account of process homology, which is presented in a separate contribution by DiFrisco and Jaeger to this focus issue.
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Affiliation(s)
- Johannes Jaeger
- Complexity Science Hub (CSH) Vienna, Josefstädter Strasse 39, 1080 Vienna, Austria
| | - Nick Monk
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sheffield, Hicks Building, Sheffield S3 7RH, UK
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19
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Systematic Analysis of Targets of Pumilio-Mediated mRNA Decay Reveals that PUM1 Repression by DNA Damage Activates Translesion Synthesis. Cell Rep 2021; 31:107542. [PMID: 32375027 DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2020.107542] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/11/2019] [Revised: 01/28/2020] [Accepted: 03/31/2020] [Indexed: 02/07/2023] Open
Abstract
RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) play a pivotal role in gene expression by modulating the stability of transcripts. However, the identification of degradation target mRNAs of RBPs remains difficult. By the combined analysis of transcriptome-wide mRNA stabilities and the binding of mRNAs to human Pumilio 1 (PUM1), we identify 48 mRNAs that both bind to PUM1 and exhibit PUM1-dependent degradation. Analysis of changes in the abundance of PUM1 and its degradation target mRNAs in RNA-seq data indicate that DNA-damaging agents negatively regulate PUM1-mediated mRNA decay. Cells exposed to cisplatin have reduced PUM1 abundance and increased PCNA and UBE2A mRNAs encoding proteins involved in DNA damage tolerance by translesion synthesis (TLS). Cells overexpressing PUM1 exhibit impaired DNA synthesis and TLS and increased sensitivity to the cytotoxic effect of cisplatin. Thus, our method identifies target mRNAs of PUM1-mediated decay and reveals that cells respond to DNA damage by inhibiting PUM1-mediated mRNA decay to activate TLS.
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20
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Lu G, Shan S, Zainab B, Ayaz Z, He J, Xie Z, Rashid U, Zhang D, Mehmood Abbasi A. Novel vaccine design based on genomics data analysis: A review. Scand J Immunol 2021; 93:e12986. [PMID: 33043473 DOI: 10.1111/sji.12986] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/30/2020] [Revised: 10/04/2020] [Accepted: 10/05/2020] [Indexed: 12/28/2022]
Abstract
Modification of pathogenic strains with the passage of time is responsible for evolution in the timeline of vaccine development for last 30 years. Recent advancements in computational vaccinology on the one hand and genome sequencing approaches on the other have generated new hopes in vaccine development. The aim of this review was to discuss the evolution of vaccines, their characteristics and limitations. In this review, we highlighted the evolution of vaccines, from first generation to the current status, pointing out how different vaccines have emerged and different approaches that are being followed up in the development of more rational vaccines against a wide range of diseases. Data were collected using Google Scholar, Web of Science, Science Direct, Web of Knowledge, Scopus and Science Hub, whereas computational tools such as NCBI, GeneMANIA and STRING were used to analyse the pathways of vaccine action. Innovative tools, such as computational tools, recombinant technologies and intra-dermal devices, are currently being investigated in order to improve the immunological response. New technologies enlightened the interactions of host proteins with pathogenic proteins for vaccine candidate development, but still there is a need of integrating transcriptomic and proteomic approaches. Although immunization with genomics data is a successful approach, its advantages must be assessed case by case and its applicability depends on the nature of the agent to be immunized, the nature of the antigen and the type of immune response required to achieve effective protection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Guangli Lu
- Institute of Business, School of Business, Henan University, Henan, China
| | - Sharui Shan
- The First Affiliated Hospital of Jinan University (Guangzhou Overseas Chinese Hospital), Guangzhou, China
- Department of Rehabilitation, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Bibi Zainab
- Department of Environmental Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan
| | - Zainab Ayaz
- Department of Environmental Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan
| | - Jialiang He
- School of Food and Bioengineering, Henan University of Science and Technology, Luoyang, China
| | - Zhenxing Xie
- Basic School of Medicine, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| | - Umer Rashid
- Department of Chemistry, COMSATS University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan
| | - Dalin Zhang
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of California Davis, Sacramento, CA, USA
| | - Arshad Mehmood Abbasi
- Department of Environmental Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan
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21
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Wang YXR, Li L, Li JJ, Huang H. Network Modeling in Biology: Statistical Methods for Gene and Brain Networks. Stat Sci 2021; 36:89-108. [PMID: 34305304 DOI: 10.1214/20-sts792] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/14/2022]
Abstract
The rise of network data in many different domains has offered researchers new insight into the problem of modeling complex systems and propelled the development of numerous innovative statistical methodologies and computational tools. In this paper, we primarily focus on two types of biological networks, gene networks and brain networks, where statistical network modeling has found both fruitful and challenging applications. Unlike other network examples such as social networks where network edges can be directly observed, both gene and brain networks require careful estimation of edges using covariates as a first step. We provide a discussion on existing statistical and computational methods for edge esitimation and subsequent statistical inference problems in these two types of biological networks.
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Affiliation(s)
- Y X Rachel Wang
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sydney, Australia
| | - Lexin Li
- Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley
| | | | - Haiyan Huang
- Department of Statistics, University of California, Berkeley
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22
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Shang L, Smith JA, Zhou X. Leveraging gene co-expression patterns to infer trait-relevant tissues in genome-wide association studies. PLoS Genet 2020; 16:e1008734. [PMID: 32310941 PMCID: PMC7192514 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1008734] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/17/2019] [Revised: 04/30/2020] [Accepted: 03/24/2020] [Indexed: 12/11/2022] Open
Abstract
Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have identified many SNPs associated with various common diseases. Understanding the biological functions of these identified SNP associations requires identifying disease/trait relevant tissues or cell types. Here, we develop a network method, CoCoNet, to facilitate the identification of trait-relevant tissues or cell types. Different from existing approaches, CoCoNet incorporates tissue-specific gene co-expression networks constructed from either bulk or single cell RNA sequencing (RNAseq) studies with GWAS data for trait-tissue inference. In particular, CoCoNet relies on a covariance regression network model to express gene-level effect measurements for the given GWAS trait as a function of the tissue-specific co-expression adjacency matrix. With a composite likelihood-based inference algorithm, CoCoNet is scalable to tens of thousands of genes. We validate the performance of CoCoNet through extensive simulations. We apply CoCoNet for an in-depth analysis of four neurological disorders and four autoimmune diseases, where we integrate the corresponding GWASs with bulk RNAseq data from 38 tissues and single cell RNAseq data from 10 cell types. In the real data applications, we show how CoCoNet can help identify specific glial cell types relevant for neurological disorders and identify disease-targeted colon tissues as relevant for autoimmune diseases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lulu Shang
- Department of Biostatistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
| | - Jennifer A. Smith
- Department of Epidemiology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
- Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
| | - Xiang Zhou
- Department of Biostatistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
- Center for Statistical Genetics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
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23
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Lu K, Feng F, Yang Y, Liu K, Duan J, Liu H, Yang J, Wu M, Liu C, Chang Y. High-throughput screening identified miR-7-2-3p and miR-29c-3p as metastasis suppressors in gallbladder carcinoma. J Gastroenterol 2020; 55:51-66. [PMID: 31562534 DOI: 10.1007/s00535-019-01627-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/17/2019] [Accepted: 09/01/2019] [Indexed: 02/04/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Gallbladder carcinoma (GBC) is one of the most aggressive and lethal tumors, with extremely high metastatic activity and poor prognosis. Previously we have studied miRNAs that promote metastasis and progression of GBC, the aim of present study was to systematically elucidate the metastasis suppressor miRNAs in GBC. METHODS A novel designed high-throughput screening method that combined high content screening (HCS) and miRNA microarray analysis was conducted to filter out anti-metastatic miRNAs of GBC. Frozen samples were analyzed for the expression of goal miRNAs by real-time PCR. The biological functions of miRNAs were studied by transwell, immunoblot. Liver metastasis model via spleen injection was further examined in nude mice. Kaplan-Meier and Cox regression analyses were used to analyze the effect of goal miRNAs on overall survival. The target genes and interaction network of goal miRNAs were determined by whole transcriptome genome sequencing. RESULTS Out of the miRNAs library, a series of prominent metastatic suppressor miRNA candidates were filtered out. Among them, miR-7-2-3p and miR-29c-3p were discovered downregulated in GBC, and upregulation of them could reverse epithelial-mesenchymal transition and decrease the metastasis ability of GBC cells in vitro and in vivo, which was dominated by the miRNA-mRNA-lncRNA co-expression network. And DCLK1 and SLC36A1 are the direct target genes of miR-7-2-3p and miR-29c-3p. Moreover, the deficiency of miR-7-2-3p and miR-29c-3p was closely associated with poor prognosis of GBC patients. CONCLUSIONS Our findings indicate that miR-7-2-3p and miR-29c-3p play crucial roles in the pathogenesis and worse prognosis of GBCs, which may serve as prognosis biomarkers and promise potential therapeutic targets in the future.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kai Lu
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Feiling Feng
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Yingcheng Yang
- Organ Transplantation Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Kai Liu
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Jicheng Duan
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Hu Liu
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Jiahe Yang
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Mengchao Wu
- Hepatic Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China
| | - Chen Liu
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China.
| | - Yanxin Chang
- Biliary Tract Surgery Department, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, 200438, People's Republic of China.
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24
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Zhang J, Ju S. Identifying genuine protein-protein interactions within communities of gene co-expression networks using a deconvolution method. IET Syst Biol 2019; 13:290-296. [PMID: 31778125 PMCID: PMC8687158 DOI: 10.1049/iet-syb.2019.0060] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/09/2019] [Revised: 06/24/2019] [Accepted: 07/09/2019] [Indexed: 11/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Direct relationships between biological molecules connected in a gene co-expression network tend to reflect real biological activities such as gene regulation, protein-protein interactions (PPIs), and metabolisation. As correlation-based networks contain numerous indirect connections, those direct relationships are always 'hidden' in them. Compared with the global network, network communities imply more biological significance on predicting protein function, detecting protein complexes and studying network evolution. Therefore, identifying direct relationships in communities is a pervasive and important topic in the biological sciences. Unfortunately, this field has not been well studied. A major thrust of this study is to apply a deconvolution algorithm on communities stemming from different gene co-expression networks, which are constructed by fixing different thresholds for robustness analysis. Using the fifth Dialogue on Reverse Engineering Assessment and Methods challenge (DREAM5) framework, the authors demonstrate that nearly all new communities extracted from a 'deconvolution filter' contain more genuine PPIs than before deconvolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jin Zhang
- School of Information Science and Engineering, University of Jinan, Jinan 250022, People's Republic of China.
| | - Shan Ju
- School of International Trade and Economics, Shandong University of Finance and Economics, Jinan 250014, People's Republic of China
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25
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Mercatelli D, Scalambra L, Triboli L, Ray F, Giorgi FM. Gene regulatory network inference resources: A practical overview. BIOCHIMICA ET BIOPHYSICA ACTA-GENE REGULATORY MECHANISMS 2019; 1863:194430. [PMID: 31678629 DOI: 10.1016/j.bbagrm.2019.194430] [Citation(s) in RCA: 58] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/31/2019] [Revised: 09/06/2019] [Accepted: 09/09/2019] [Indexed: 02/08/2023]
Abstract
Transcriptional regulation is a fundamental molecular mechanism involved in almost every aspect of life, from homeostasis to development, from metabolism to behavior, from reaction to stimuli to disease progression. In recent years, the concept of Gene Regulatory Networks (GRNs) has grown popular as an effective applied biology approach for describing the complex and highly dynamic set of transcriptional interactions, due to its easy-to-interpret features. Since cataloguing, predicting and understanding every GRN connection in all species and cellular contexts remains a great challenge for biology, researchers have developed numerous tools and methods to infer regulatory processes. In this review, we catalogue these methods in six major areas, based on the dominant underlying information leveraged to infer GRNs: Coexpression, Sequence Motifs, Chromatin Immunoprecipitation (ChIP), Orthology, Literature and Protein-Protein Interaction (PPI) specifically focused on transcriptional complexes. The methods described here cover a wide range of user-friendliness: from web tools that require no prior computational expertise to command line programs and algorithms for large scale GRN inferences. Each method for GRN inference described herein effectively illustrates a type of transcriptional relationship, with many methods being complementary to others. While a truly holistic approach for inferring and displaying GRNs remains one of the greatest challenges in the field of systems biology, we believe that the integration of multiple methods described herein provides an effective means with which experimental and computational biologists alike may obtain the most complete pictures of transcriptional relationships. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Transcriptional Profiles and Regulatory Gene Networks edited by Dr. Federico Manuel Giorgi and Dr. Shaun Mahony.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniele Mercatelli
- Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
| | - Laura Scalambra
- Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
| | - Luca Triboli
- Centre for Integrative Biology (CIBIO), University of Trento, Italy
| | - Forest Ray
- Department of Systems Biology, Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY, United States
| | - Federico M Giorgi
- Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
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26
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Mariani MK, Dasmeh P, Fortin A, Caron E, Kalamujic M, Harrison AN, Hotea DI, Kasumba DM, Cervantes-Ortiz SL, Mukawera E, Serohijos AWR, Grandvaux N. The Combination of IFN β and TNF Induces an Antiviral and Immunoregulatory Program via Non-Canonical Pathways Involving STAT2 and IRF9. Cells 2019; 8:cells8080919. [PMID: 31426476 PMCID: PMC6721756 DOI: 10.3390/cells8080919] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/17/2019] [Revised: 08/12/2019] [Accepted: 08/14/2019] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Interferon (IFN) β and Tumor Necrosis Factor (TNF) are key players in immunity against viruses. Compelling evidence has shown that the antiviral and inflammatory transcriptional response induced by IFNβ is reprogrammed by crosstalk with TNF. IFNβ mainly induces interferon-stimulated genes by the Janus kinase (JAK)/signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT) pathway involving the canonical ISGF3 transcriptional complex, composed of STAT1, STAT2, and IRF9. The signaling pathways engaged downstream of the combination of IFNβ and TNF remain elusive, but previous observations suggested the existence of a response independent of STAT1. Here, using genome-wide transcriptional analysis by RNASeq, we observed a broad antiviral and immunoregulatory response initiated in the absence of STAT1 upon IFNβ and TNF costimulation. Additional stratification of this transcriptional response revealed that STAT2 and IRF9 mediate the expression of a wide spectrum of genes. While a subset of genes was regulated by the concerted action of STAT2 and IRF9, other gene sets were independently regulated by STAT2 or IRF9. Collectively, our data supports a model in which STAT2 and IRF9 act through non-canonical parallel pathways to regulate distinct pool of antiviral and immunoregulatory genes in conditions with elevated levels of both IFNβ and TNF.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mélissa K Mariani
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
| | - Pouria Dasmeh
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
- Centre Robert Cedergren en Bioinformatique et Génomique, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
| | - Audray Fortin
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
| | - Elise Caron
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
| | - Mario Kalamujic
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
| | - Alexander N Harrison
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
- Department of Microbiology and Immunology, McGill University, Montréal, QC H3A 2B4, Canada
| | - Diana I Hotea
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
| | - Dacquin M Kasumba
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
| | - Sandra L Cervantes-Ortiz
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
- Department of Microbiology, Infectiology and Immunology, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
| | - Espérance Mukawera
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada
| | - Adrian W R Serohijos
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
- Centre Robert Cedergren en Bioinformatique et Génomique, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada
| | - Nathalie Grandvaux
- CRCHUM-Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H2X 0A9, Canada.
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H3T 1J4, Canada.
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Jiang J, Xing F, Wang C, Zeng X, Zou Q. Investigation and development of maize fused network analysis with multi-omics. PLANT PHYSIOLOGY AND BIOCHEMISTRY : PPB 2019; 141:380-387. [PMID: 31220804 DOI: 10.1016/j.plaphy.2019.06.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/20/2019] [Revised: 06/12/2019] [Accepted: 06/12/2019] [Indexed: 05/19/2023]
Abstract
Maize is a critically important staple crop in the whole world, which has contributed to both economic security and food in planting areas. The main target for researchers and breeding is the improvement of maize quality and yield. The use of computational biology methods combined with multi-omics for selecting biomolecules of interest for maize breeding has been receiving more attention. Moreover, the rapid growth of high-throughput sequencing data provides the opportunity to explore biomolecules of interest at the molecular level in maize. Furthermore, we constructed weighted networks for each of the omics and then integrated them into a final fused weighted network based on a nonlinear combination method. We also analyzed the final fused network and mined the orphan nodes, some of which were shown to be transcription factors that played a key role in maize development. This study could help to improve maize production via insights at the multi-omics level and provide a new perspective for maize researchers. All related data have been released at http://lab.malab.cn/∼jj/maize.htm.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jing Jiang
- School of Aerospace Engineering, Xiamen University, Xiamen, 361001, China
| | - Fei Xing
- School of Aerospace Engineering, Xiamen University, Xiamen, 361001, China
| | - Chunyu Wang
- School of Computer Science and Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, China
| | - Xiangxiang Zeng
- School of Information Science and Engineering, Hunan University, 410082, Changsha, China.
| | - Quan Zou
- Institute of Fundamental and Frontier Sciences, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, 610000, China.
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Verd B, Monk NAM, Jaeger J. Modularity, criticality, and evolvability of a developmental gene regulatory network. eLife 2019; 8:e42832. [PMID: 31169494 PMCID: PMC6645726 DOI: 10.7554/elife.42832] [Citation(s) in RCA: 47] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/14/2019] [Accepted: 06/05/2019] [Indexed: 01/16/2023] Open
Abstract
The existence of discrete phenotypic traits suggests that the complex regulatory processes which produce them are functionally modular. These processes are usually represented by networks. Only modular networks can be partitioned into intelligible subcircuits able to evolve relatively independently. Traditionally, functional modularity is approximated by detection of modularity in network structure. However, the correlation between structure and function is loose. Many regulatory networks exhibit modular behaviour without structural modularity. Here we partition an experimentally tractable regulatory network-the gap gene system of dipteran insects-using an alternative approach. We show that this system, although not structurally modular, is composed of dynamical modules driving different aspects of whole-network behaviour. All these subcircuits share the same regulatory structure, but differ in components and sensitivity to regulatory interactions. Some subcircuits are in a state of criticality, while others are not, which explains the observed differential evolvability of the various expression features in the system.
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Affiliation(s)
- Berta Verd
- EMBL/CRG Systems Biology Research Unit, Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG)The Barcelona Institute of Science and TechnologyBarcelonaSpain
- Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF)BarcelonaSpain
- Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research (KLI)KlosterneuburgAustria
- Department of GeneticsUniversity of CambridgeCambridgeUnited Kingdom
| | - Nicholas AM Monk
- School of Mathematics and StatisticsUniversity of SheffieldSheffieldUnited States
| | - Johannes Jaeger
- EMBL/CRG Systems Biology Research Unit, Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG)The Barcelona Institute of Science and TechnologyBarcelonaSpain
- Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF)BarcelonaSpain
- Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research (KLI)KlosterneuburgAustria
- School of Mathematics and StatisticsUniversity of SheffieldSheffieldUnited States
- Wissenschaftskolleg zu BerlinBerlinGermany
- Center for Systems Biology Dresden (CSBD)DresdenGermany
- Complexity Science Hub (CSH)ViennaAustria
- Centre de Recherches Interdisciplinaires (CRI)ParisFrance
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29
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Guo Y, Bao C, Ma D, Cao Y, Li Y, Xie Z, Li S. Network-Based Combinatorial CRISPR-Cas9 Screens Identify Synergistic Modules in Human Cells. ACS Synth Biol 2019; 8:482-490. [PMID: 30762338 DOI: 10.1021/acssynbio.8b00237] [Citation(s) in RCA: 39] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/26/2022]
Abstract
Tumorigenesis is a complex process that is driven by a combination of networks of genes and environmental factors; however, efficient approaches to identifying functional networks that are perturbed by the process of tumorigenesis are lacking. In this study, we provide a comprehensive network-based strategy for the systematic discovery of functional synergistic modules that are causal determinants of inflammation-induced tumorigenesis. Our approach prioritizes candidate genes selected by integrating clinical-based and network-based genome-wide gene prediction methods and identifies functional synergistic modules based on combinatorial CRISPR-Cas9 screening. On the basis of candidate genes inferred de novo from experimental and computational methods to be involved in inflammation and cancer, we used an existing TGFβ1-induced cellular transformation model in colonic epithelial cells and a new combinatorial CRISPR-Cas9 screening strategy to construct an inflammation-induced differential genetic interaction network. The inflammation-induced differential genetic interaction network that we generated yielded functional insights into the genes and functional module combinations, and showed varied responses to the inflammation agents as well as active traditional Chinese medicine compounds. We identified opposing differential genetic interactions of inflammation-induced tumorigenesis: synergistic promotion and suppression. The synergistic promotion state was primarily caused by deletions in the immune and metabolism modules; the synergistic suppression state was primarily induced by deletions in the proliferation and immune modules or in the proliferation and metabolism modules. These results provide insight into possible early combinational targets and biomarkers for inflammation-induced tumorigenesis and highlight the synergistic effects that occur among immune, proliferation, and metabolism modules. In conclusion, this approach deepens the understanding of the underlying mechanisms that cause inflammation to potentially increase the cancer risk of colonic epithelial cells and accelerate the translation into novel functional modules or synergistic module combinations that modulate complex disease phenotypes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yucheng Guo
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Chen Bao
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Dacheng Ma
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Yubing Cao
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Yanda Li
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Zhen Xie
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
| | - Shao Li
- MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and TCM-X Center/Bioinformatics Division/TFIDT, BNRist, Department of Automation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
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30
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Ko Y, Kim J, Rodriguez-Zas SL. Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation of a Bayesian mixture model for gene network inference. Genes Genomics 2019; 41:547-555. [PMID: 30741379 DOI: 10.1007/s13258-019-00789-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/16/2018] [Accepted: 01/21/2019] [Indexed: 12/31/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Simultaneous measurement of gene expression level for thousands of genes contains the rich information about many different aspects of biological mechanisms. A major computational challenge is to find methods to extract new biological insights from this wealth of data. Complex biological processes are often regulated under the various conditions or circumstances and associated gene interactions are dynamically changed depending on different biological contexts. Thus, inference of such dynamic relationships between genes with consideration of biological conditions is very challenging. METHOD In this study, we propose a comprehensive and integrated approach to infer the dynamic relationships between genes and evaluate this approach on three distinct gene networks. RESULTS This study demonstrates the advantage of integrating Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation into a Bayesian mixture model to overcome the high-dimension, low sample size (HDLSS) problem as well as to identify context-specific biological modules. Such biological modules were identified through the summarization of sampled network structures obtained from MCMC simulation. CONCLUSION This novel approach gives a comprehensive understanding of the dynamically regulated biological modules.
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Affiliation(s)
- Younhee Ko
- Division of Biomedical Engineering, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Gyeonggi-do, 17035, South Korea
| | - Jaebum Kim
- Department of Biomedical Science and Engineering, Konkuk University, Seoul, 05029, South Korea.
| | - Sandra L Rodriguez-Zas
- Department of Animal Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA.
- Department of Statistics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA.
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31
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Larsen SJ, Röttger R, Schmidt HH, Baumbach J. E. coli gene regulatory networks are inconsistent with gene expression data. Nucleic Acids Res 2019; 47:85-92. [PMID: 30462289 PMCID: PMC6326786 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gky1176] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/28/2018] [Revised: 10/29/2018] [Accepted: 11/05/2018] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Gene regulatory networks (GRNs) and gene expression data form a core element of systems biology-based phenotyping. Changes in the expression of transcription factors are commonly believed to have a causal effect on the expression of their targets. Here we evaluated in the best researched model organism, Escherichia coli, the consistency between a GRN and a large gene expression compendium. Surprisingly, a modest correlation was observed between the expression of transcription factors and their targets and, most noteworthy, both activating and repressing interactions were associated with positive correlation. When evaluated using a sign consistency model we found the regulatory network was not more consistent with measured expression than random network models. We conclude that, at least in E. coli, one cannot expect a causal relationship between the expression of transcription and factors their targets, and that the current static GRN does not adequately explain transcriptional regulation. The implications of this are profound as they question what we consider established knowledge of the systemic biology of cells and point to methodological limitations with respect to single omics analysis, static networks and temporality.
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Affiliation(s)
- Simon J Larsen
- Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Southern Denmark, Campusvej 55, 5230 Odense, Denmark
| | - Richard Röttger
- Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Southern Denmark, Campusvej 55, 5230 Odense, Denmark
| | - Harald H H W Schmidt
- Department of Pharmacology and Personalised Medicine, MaCSBio, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 60, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Jan Baumbach
- Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Southern Denmark, Campusvej 55, 5230 Odense, Denmark
- Chair of Experimental Bioinformatics, Wissenschaftszentrum Weihenstephan, Technical University of Munich, Maximus-von-Imhof-Forum 3, 85354 Freising-Weihenstephan, Germany
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32
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Yamada T, Akimitsu N. Contributions of regulated transcription and mRNA decay to the dynamics of gene expression. WILEY INTERDISCIPLINARY REVIEWS-RNA 2018; 10:e1508. [PMID: 30276972 DOI: 10.1002/wrna.1508] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/29/2018] [Revised: 08/06/2018] [Accepted: 08/27/2018] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
Organisms have acquired sophisticated regulatory networks that control gene expression in response to cellular perturbations. Understanding of the mechanisms underlying the coordinated changes in gene expression in response to external and internal stimuli is a fundamental issue in biology. Recent advances in high-throughput technologies have enabled the measurement of diverse biological information, including gene expression levels, kinetics of gene expression, and interactions among gene expression regulatory molecules. By coupling these technologies with quantitative modeling, we can now uncover the biological roles and mechanisms of gene regulation at the system level. This review consists of two parts. First, we focus on the methods using uridine analogs that measure synthesis and decay rates of RNAs, which demonstrate how cells dynamically change the regulation of gene expression in response to both internal and external cues. Second, we discuss the underlying mechanisms of these changes in kinetics, including the functions of transcription factors and RNA-binding proteins. Overall, this review will help to clarify a system-level view of gene expression programs in cells. This article is categorized under: Regulatory RNAs/RNAi/Riboswitches > Regulatory RNAs RNA Turnover and Surveillance > Regulation of RNA Stability RNA Methods > RNA Analyses in vitro and In Silico.
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Affiliation(s)
- Toshimichi Yamada
- Department of Molecular and Cellular Biochemistry, Meiji Pharmaceutical University, Tokyo, Japan
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33
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van Dam S, Võsa U, van der Graaf A, Franke L, de Magalhães JP. Gene co-expression analysis for functional classification and gene-disease predictions. Brief Bioinform 2018; 19:575-592. [PMID: 28077403 PMCID: PMC6054162 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbw139] [Citation(s) in RCA: 431] [Impact Index Per Article: 71.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/12/2016] [Revised: 12/01/2016] [Indexed: 01/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Gene co-expression networks can be used to associate genes of unknown function with biological processes, to prioritize candidate disease genes or to discern transcriptional regulatory programmes. With recent advances in transcriptomics and next-generation sequencing, co-expression networks constructed from RNA sequencing data also enable the inference of functions and disease associations for non-coding genes and splice variants. Although gene co-expression networks typically do not provide information about causality, emerging methods for differential co-expression analysis are enabling the identification of regulatory genes underlying various phenotypes. Here, we introduce and guide researchers through a (differential) co-expression analysis. We provide an overview of methods and tools used to create and analyse co-expression networks constructed from gene expression data, and we explain how these can be used to identify genes with a regulatory role in disease. Furthermore, we discuss the integration of other data types with co-expression networks and offer future perspectives of co-expression analysis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sipko van Dam
- Department of Genetics, UMCG HPC CB50, RB Groningen, Netherlands
| | - Urmo Võsa
- Department of Genetics, UMCG HPC CB50, RB Groningen, Netherlands
| | | | - Lude Franke
- Department of Genetics, UMCG HPC CB50, RB Groningen, Netherlands
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Wu WS, Chen PH, Chen TT, Tseng YY. YGMD: a repository for yeast cooperative transcription factor sets and their target gene modules. DATABASE-THE JOURNAL OF BIOLOGICAL DATABASES AND CURATION 2018; 2017:4596568. [PMID: 29220473 PMCID: PMC5691354 DOI: 10.1093/database/bax085] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/16/2017] [Accepted: 10/19/2017] [Indexed: 01/02/2023]
Abstract
By organizing the genome into gene modules (GMs), a living cell coordinates the activities of a set of genes to properly respond to environmental changes. The transcriptional regulation of the expression of a GM is usually carried out by a cooperative transcription factor set (CoopTFS) consisting of several cooperative transcription factors (TFs). Therefore, a database which provides CoopTFSs and their target GMs is useful for studying the cellular responses to internal or external stimuli. To address this need, here we constructed YGMD (Yeast Gene Module Database) to provide 34120 CoopTFSs, each of which consists of two to five cooperative TFs, and their target GMs. The cooperativity between TFs in a CoopTFS is suggested by physical/genetic interaction evidence or/and predicted by existing algorithms. The target GM regulated by a CoopTFS is defined as the common target genes of all the TFs in that CoopTFS. The regulatory association between any TF in a CoopTFS and any gene in the target GM is supported by experimental evidence in the literature. In YGMD, users can (i) search the GM regulated by a specific CoopTFS of interest or (ii) search all possible CoopTFSs whose target GMs contain a specific gene of interest. The biological relevance of YGMD is shown by a case study which demonstrates that YGMD can provide a GM enriched with genes known to be regulated by the query CoopTFS (Cbf1-Met4-Met32). We believe that YGMD provides a valuable resource for yeast biologists to study the transcriptional regulation of GMs. Database URL:http://cosbi4.ee.ncku.edu.tw/YGMD/, http://cosbi5.ee.ncku.edu.tw/YGMD/ or http://cosbi.ee.ncku.edu.tw/YGMD/
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Affiliation(s)
- Wei-Sheng Wu
- Department of Electrical Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan
| | - Pin-Han Chen
- Department of Electrical Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan
| | - Tsung-Te Chen
- Department of Electrical Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan
| | - Yan-Yuan Tseng
- Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Wayne State University, School of Medicine, Detroit, MI 48201, USA
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35
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Leveraging human genetic and adverse outcome pathway (AOP) data to inform susceptibility in human health risk assessment. Mamm Genome 2018; 29:190-204. [DOI: 10.1007/s00335-018-9738-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/04/2017] [Accepted: 01/31/2018] [Indexed: 12/19/2022]
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36
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Pan X, Wang B, Yuan T, Zhang M, Kent KC, Guo LW. Analysis of Combined Transcriptomes Identifies Gene Modules that Differentially Respond to Pathogenic Stimulation of Vascular Smooth Muscle and Endothelial Cells. Sci Rep 2018; 8:395. [PMID: 29321689 PMCID: PMC5762668 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-18675-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/22/2017] [Accepted: 12/15/2017] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
Smooth muscle cells (SMCs) and endothelial cells (ECs) are vital cell types composing the vascular medial wall and the atheroprotective inner lining, respectively. Current treatments for cardiovascular disease inhibit SMC hyperplasia but compromise EC integrity, predisposing patients to thrombosis. Therapeutics targeting SMCs without collateral damage to ECs are highly desirable. However, differential (SMC versus EC) disease-associated regulations remain poorly defined. We conducted RNA-seq experiments to investigate SMC-versus-EC differential transcriptomic dynamics, following treatment of human primary SMCs and ECs with TNFα or IL-1β, both established inducers of SMC hyperplasia and EC dysfunction. As revealed by combined SMC/EC transcriptomes, after TNFα or IL-1β induction, 174 and 213 genes respectively showed greater up-regulation in SMCs than in ECs (SMC-enriched), while 117 and 138 genes showed greater up-regulation in ECs over SMCs (EC-enriched). Analysis of gene interaction networks identified central genes shared in the two SMC-enriched gene sets, and a distinct group of central genes common in the two EC-enriched gene sets. Significantly, four gene modules (subnetworks) were identified from these central genes, including SMC-enriched JUN and FYN modules and EC-enriched SMAD3 and XPO1 modules. These modules may inform potential intervention targets for selective blockage of SMC hyperplasia without endothelial damage.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaokang Pan
- Department of Surgery, Wisconsin Institute for Medical Research, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, 53705, USA.,James Molecular Laboratory, Comprehensive Cancer Center, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 43240, USA
| | - Bowen Wang
- Department of Surgery, College of Medicine, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 43210, USA
| | - Tiezheng Yuan
- Department of Surgery, Wisconsin Institute for Medical Research, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, 53705, USA
| | - Mengxue Zhang
- Department of Surgery, Wisconsin Institute for Medical Research, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, 53705, USA.,Department of Surgery and Department of Physiology & Cell Biology, Davis Heart and Lung Research Institute, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 43210, USA
| | - K Craig Kent
- Department of Surgery, College of Medicine, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 43210, USA
| | - Lian-Wang Guo
- Department of Surgery, Wisconsin Institute for Medical Research, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, 53705, USA. .,Department of Surgery and Department of Physiology & Cell Biology, Davis Heart and Lung Research Institute, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 43210, USA.
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37
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Rowland MA, Abdelzaher A, Ghosh P, Mayo ML. Crosstalk and the Dynamical Modularity of Feed-Forward Loops in Transcriptional Regulatory Networks. Biophys J 2017; 112:1539-1550. [PMID: 28445746 PMCID: PMC5406374 DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2017.02.044] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/13/2016] [Revised: 02/08/2017] [Accepted: 02/16/2017] [Indexed: 01/16/2023] Open
Abstract
Network motifs, such as the feed-forward loop (FFL), introduce a range of complex behaviors to transcriptional regulatory networks, yet such properties are typically determined from their isolated study. We characterize the effects of crosstalk on FFL dynamics by modeling the cross regulation between two different FFLs and evaluate the extent to which these patterns occur in vivo. Analytical modeling suggests that crosstalk should overwhelmingly affect individual protein-expression dynamics. Counter to this expectation we find that entire FFLs are more likely than expected to resist the effects of crosstalk (≈20% for one crosstalk interaction) and remain dynamically modular. The likelihood that cross-linked FFLs are dynamically correlated increases monotonically with additional crosstalk, but is independent of the specific regulation type or connectivity of the interactions. Just one additional regulatory interaction is sufficient to drive the FFL dynamics to a statistically different state. Despite the potential for modularity between sparsely connected network motifs, Escherichia coli (E. coli) appears to favor crosstalk wherein at least one of the cross-linked FFLs remains modular. A gene ontology analysis reveals that stress response processes are significantly overrepresented in the cross-linked motifs found within E. coli. Although the daunting complexity of biological networks affects the dynamical properties of individual network motifs, some resist and remain modular, seemingly insulated from extrinsic perturbations—an intriguing possibility for nature to consistently and reliably provide certain network functionalities wherever the need arise.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michael A Rowland
- Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Environmental Laboratory, U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, Vicksburg, Mississippi
| | - Ahmed Abdelzaher
- Department of Computer Science, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia
| | - Preetam Ghosh
- Department of Computer Science, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia
| | - Michael L Mayo
- Environmental Laboratory, U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, Vicksburg, Mississippi.
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38
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Abstract
Plants, like other eukaryotes, have evolved complex mechanisms to coordinate gene expression during development, environmental response, and cellular homeostasis. Transcription factors (TFs), accompanied by basic cofactors and posttranscriptional regulators, are key players in gene-regulatory networks (GRNs). The coordinated control of gene activity is achieved by the interplay of these factors and by physical interactions between TFs and DNA. Here, we will briefly outline recent technological progress made to elucidate GRNs in plants. We will focus on techniques that allow us to characterize physical interactions in GRNs in plants and to analyze their regulatory consequences. Targeted manipulation allows us to test the relevance of specific gene-regulatory interactions. The combination of genome-wide experimental approaches with mathematical modeling allows us to get deeper insights into key-regulatory interactions and combinatorial control of important processes in plants.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kerstin Kaufmann
- Department for Plant Cell and Molecular Biology, Institute for Biology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 10115, Berlin, Germany.
| | - Dijun Chen
- Department for Plant Cell and Molecular Biology, Institute for Biology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 10115, Berlin, Germany.,Institute for Biochemistry and Biology, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany
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39
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Wang Y, Zhao W, Zhou X. Matrix factorization reveals aging-specific co-expression gene modules in the fat and muscle tissues in nonhuman primates. Sci Rep 2016; 6:34335. [PMID: 27703186 PMCID: PMC5050522 DOI: 10.1038/srep34335] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/02/2016] [Accepted: 09/12/2016] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
Accurate identification of coherent transcriptional modules (subnetworks) in adipose and muscle tissues is important for revealing the related mechanisms and co-regulated pathways involved in the development of aging-related diseases. Here, we proposed a systematically computational approach, called ICEGM, to Identify the Co-Expression Gene Modules through a novel mathematical framework of Higher-Order Generalized Singular Value Decomposition (HO-GSVD). ICEGM was applied on the adipose, and heart and skeletal muscle tissues in old and young female African green vervet monkeys. The genes associated with the development of inflammation, cardiovascular and skeletal disorder diseases, and cancer were revealed by the ICEGM. Meanwhile, genes in the ICEGM modules were also enriched in the adipocytes, smooth muscle cells, cardiac myocytes, and immune cells. Comprehensive disease annotation and canonical pathway analysis indicated that immune cells, adipocytes, cardiomyocytes, and smooth muscle cells played a synergistic role in cardiac and physical functions in the aged monkeys by regulation of the biological processes associated with metabolism, inflammation, and atherosclerosis. In conclusion, the ICEGM provides an efficiently systematic framework for decoding the co-expression gene modules in multiple tissues. Analysis of genes in the ICEGM module yielded important insights on the cooperative role of multiple tissues in the development of diseases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yongcui Wang
- Center for Bioinformatics & Systems Biology, Department of Radiology, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston Salem, NC, USA
- Key Laboratory of Adaptation and Evolution of Plateau Biota, Northwest Institute of Plateau Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xining, China
| | - Weiling Zhao
- Center for Bioinformatics & Systems Biology, Department of Radiology, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston Salem, NC, USA
| | - Xiaobo Zhou
- Center for Bioinformatics & Systems Biology, Department of Radiology, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston Salem, NC, USA
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40
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Monte E, Rosa-Garrido M, Vondriska TM, Wang J. Undiscovered Physiology of Transcript and Protein Networks. Compr Physiol 2016; 6:1851-1872. [PMID: 27783861 PMCID: PMC10751805 DOI: 10.1002/cphy.c160003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/07/2022]
Abstract
The past two decades have witnessed a rapid evolution in our ability to measure RNA and protein from biological systems. As a result, new principles have arisen regarding how information is processed in cells, how decisions are made, and the role of networks in biology. This essay examines this technological evolution, reviewing (and critiquing) the conceptual framework that has emerged to explain how RNA and protein networks control cellular function. We identify how future investigations into transcriptomes, proteomes, and other cellular networks will enable development of more robust, quantitative models of cellular behavior whilst also providing new avenues to use knowledge of biological networks to improve human health. © 2016 American Physiological Society. Compr Physiol 6:1851-1872, 2016.
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Affiliation(s)
- Emma Monte
- Department of Anesthesiology & Perioperative Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
| | - Manuel Rosa-Garrido
- Department of Anesthesiology & Perioperative Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
| | - Thomas M. Vondriska
- Department of Anesthesiology & Perioperative Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
- Department of Medicine/Cardiology, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
- Department of Physiology, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
| | - Jessica Wang
- Department of Medicine/Cardiology, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
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41
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Walley JW, Sartor RC, Shen Z, Schmitz RJ, Wu KJ, Urich MA, Nery JR, Smith LG, Schnable JC, Ecker JR, Briggs SP. Integration of omic networks in a developmental atlas of maize. Science 2016; 353:814-8. [PMID: 27540173 DOI: 10.1126/science.aag1125] [Citation(s) in RCA: 296] [Impact Index Per Article: 37.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/10/2016] [Accepted: 07/25/2016] [Indexed: 12/23/2022]
Abstract
Coexpression networks and gene regulatory networks (GRNs) are emerging as important tools for predicting functional roles of individual genes at a system-wide scale. To enable network reconstructions, we built a large-scale gene expression atlas composed of 62,547 messenger RNAs (mRNAs), 17,862 nonmodified proteins, and 6227 phosphoproteins harboring 31,595 phosphorylation sites quantified across maize development. Networks in which nodes are genes connected on the basis of highly correlated expression patterns of mRNAs were very different from networks that were based on coexpression of proteins. Roughly 85% of highly interconnected hubs were not conserved in expression between RNA and protein networks. However, networks from either data type were enriched in similar ontological categories and were effective in predicting known regulatory relationships. Integration of mRNA, protein, and phosphoprotein data sets greatly improved the predictive power of GRNs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Justin W Walley
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA. Department of Plant Pathology and Microbiology, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011, USA
| | - Ryan C Sartor
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA
| | - Zhouxin Shen
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA
| | - Robert J Schmitz
- Plant Biology Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Genomic Analysis Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Kevin J Wu
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA
| | - Mark A Urich
- Plant Biology Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Genomic Analysis Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Joseph R Nery
- Genomic Analysis Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Laurie G Smith
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA
| | - James C Schnable
- Department of Agronomy and Horticulture, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE 68583, USA
| | - Joseph R Ecker
- Plant Biology Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Genomic Analysis Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Howard Hughes Medical Institute, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, 10010 North Torrey Pines Road, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Steven P Briggs
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA.
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42
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Till A, Saito R, Merkurjev D, Liu JJ, Syed GH, Kolnik M, Siddiqui A, Glas M, Scheffler B, Ideker T, Subramani S. Evolutionary trends and functional anatomy of the human expanded autophagy network. Autophagy 2016; 11:1652-67. [PMID: 26103419 DOI: 10.1080/15548627.2015.1059558] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/01/2023] Open
Abstract
All eukaryotic cells utilize autophagy for protein and organelle turnover, thus assuring subcellular quality control, homeostasis, and survival. In order to address recent advances in identification of human autophagy associated genes, and to describe autophagy on a system-wide level, we established an autophagy-centered gene interaction network by merging various primary data sets and by retrieving respective interaction data. The resulting network ('AXAN') was analyzed with respect to subnetworks, e.g. the prime gene subnetwork (including the core machinery, signaling pathways and autophagy receptors) and the transcription subnetwork. To describe aspects of evolution within this network, we assessed the presence of protein orthologs across 99 eukaryotic model organisms. We visualized evolutionary trends for prime gene categories and evolutionary tracks for selected AXAN genes. This analysis confirms the eukaryotic origin of autophagy core genes while it points to a diverse evolutionary history of autophagy receptors. Next, we used module identification to describe the functional anatomy of the network at the level of pathway modules. In addition to obvious pathways (e.g., lysosomal degradation, insulin signaling) our data unveil the existence of context-related modules such as Rho GTPase signaling. Last, we used a tripartite, image-based RNAi - screen to test candidate genes predicted to play a role in regulation of autophagy. We verified the Rho GTPase, CDC42, as a novel regulator of autophagy-related signaling. This study emphasizes the applicability of system-wide approaches to gain novel insights into a complex biological process and to describe the human autophagy pathway at a hitherto unprecedented level of detail.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andreas Till
- a Section of Molecular Biology; University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA.,b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA.,c Stem Cell Pathologies Group/Life&Brain GmbH; University Clinic Bonn ; Bonn , Germany
| | - Rintaro Saito
- b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA.,d Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering ; University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Daria Merkurjev
- b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Jing-Jing Liu
- a Section of Molecular Biology; University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA.,b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Gulam Hussain Syed
- e Division of Infectious Diseases ; Department of Medicine University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Martin Kolnik
- b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Aleem Siddiqui
- e Division of Infectious Diseases ; Department of Medicine University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Martin Glas
- c Stem Cell Pathologies Group/Life&Brain GmbH; University Clinic Bonn ; Bonn , Germany.,f Clinical Cooperation Unit Neurooncology; MediClin Robert Janker Klinik ; Bonn , Germany
| | - Björn Scheffler
- c Stem Cell Pathologies Group/Life&Brain GmbH; University Clinic Bonn ; Bonn , Germany.,f Clinical Cooperation Unit Neurooncology; MediClin Robert Janker Klinik ; Bonn , Germany
| | - Trey Ideker
- b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA.,d Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering ; University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA
| | - Suresh Subramani
- a Section of Molecular Biology; University of California San Diego ; La Jolla , CA USA.,b The San Diego Center for Systems Biology ; La Jolla , CA USA
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43
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Ochiai T, Nacher JC. Predicting link directionality in gene regulation from gene expression profiles using volatility-constrained correlation. Biosystems 2016; 145:9-18. [PMID: 27164307 DOI: 10.1016/j.biosystems.2016.05.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/14/2016] [Revised: 05/03/2016] [Accepted: 05/05/2016] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
To uncover potential disease molecular pathways and signaling networks, we do not only need undirected maps but also we need to infer the directionality of functional or physical interactions between cellular components. A wide range of methods for identifying functional interactions between genes relies on correlations between experimental gene expression measurements to some extent. However, the standard Pearson or Spearman correlation-based approaches can only determine undirected correlations between cellular components. Here, we apply a volatility-constrained correlation method for gene expression profiles that offers a new metric to capture directionality of interactions between genes. To evaluate the predictions we used four datasets distributed by the DREAM5 network inference challenge including an in silico-constructed network and three organisms such as S. aureus, E. coli and S. cerevisiae. The predictions performed by our proposed method were compared to a gold standard of experimentally verified directionality of genetic regulatory links. Our findings show that our method successfully predicts the genetic interaction directionality with a success rate higher than 0.5 with high statistical significance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tomoshiro Ochiai
- Faculty of Social Information Studies, Otsuma Women's University, 2-7-1 Karakida, Tama-shi, Tokyo 206-8540, Japan.
| | - Jose C Nacher
- Department of Information Science, Faculty of Science, Toho University, Miyama 2-2-1, Funabashi, Chiba 274-8510, Japan.
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44
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Zhang C, Lee S, Mardinoglu A, Hua Q. Investigating the Combinatory Effects of Biological Networks on Gene Co-expression. Front Physiol 2016; 7:160. [PMID: 27445830 PMCID: PMC4916787 DOI: 10.3389/fphys.2016.00160] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/11/2016] [Accepted: 04/15/2016] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Co-expressed genes often share similar functions, and gene co-expression networks have been widely used in studying the functionality of gene modules. Previous analysis indicated that genes are more likely to be co-expressed if they are either regulated by the same transcription factors, forming protein complexes or sharing similar topological properties in protein-protein interaction networks. Here, we reconstructed transcriptional regulatory and protein-protein networks for Saccharomyces cerevisiae using well-established databases, and we evaluated their co-expression activities using publically available gene expression data. Based on our network-dependent analysis, we found that genes that were co-regulated in the transcription regulatory networks and shared similar neighbors in the protein-protein networks were more likely to be co-expressed. Moreover, their biological functions were closely related.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cheng Zhang
- State Key Laboratory of Bioreactor Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology Shanghai, China
| | - Sunjae Lee
- Science for Life Laboratory, KTH-Royal Institute of Technology Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Adil Mardinoglu
- Science for Life Laboratory, KTH-Royal Institute of TechnologyStockholm, Sweden; Department of Biology and Biological Engineering, Chalmers University of TechnologyGöteborg, Sweden
| | - Qiang Hua
- State Key Laboratory of Bioreactor Engineering, East China University of Science and TechnologyShanghai, China; Shanghai Collaborative Innovation Center for Biomanufacturing TechnologyShanghai, China
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45
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Hu Y, Zhao H. CCor: A whole genome network-based similarity measure between two genes. Biometrics 2016; 72:1216-1225. [PMID: 26953524 DOI: 10.1111/biom.12508] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/01/2015] [Revised: 01/01/2016] [Accepted: 02/01/2016] [Indexed: 12/29/2022]
Abstract
Measuring the similarity between genes is often the starting point for building gene regulatory networks. Most similarity measures used in practice only consider pairwise information with a few also consider network structure. Although theoretical properties of pairwise measures are well understood in the statistics literature, little is known about their statistical properties of those similarity measures based on network structure. In this article, we consider a new whole genome network-based similarity measure, called CCor, that makes use of information of all the genes in the network. We derive a concentration inequality of CCor and compare it with the commonly used Pearson correlation coefficient for inferring network modules. Both theoretical analysis and real data example demonstrate the advantages of CCor over existing measures for inferring gene modules.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yiming Hu
- Department of Biostatistics, Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A
| | - Hongyu Zhao
- Department of Biostatistics, Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A.,Program of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A
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46
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He B, Tan K. Understanding transcriptional regulatory networks using computational models. Curr Opin Genet Dev 2016; 37:101-108. [PMID: 26950762 DOI: 10.1016/j.gde.2016.02.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2015] [Revised: 01/29/2016] [Accepted: 02/08/2016] [Indexed: 01/06/2023]
Abstract
Transcriptional regulatory networks (TRNs) encode instructions for animal development and physiological responses. Recent advances in genomic technologies and computational modeling have revolutionized our ability to construct models of TRNs. Here, we survey current computational methods for inferring TRN models using genome-scale data. We discuss their advantages and limitations. We summarize representative TRNs constructed using genome-scale data in both normal and disease development. We discuss lessons learned about the structure/function relationship of TRNs, based on examining various large-scale TRN models. Finally, we outline some open questions regarding TRNs, including how to improve model accuracy by integrating complementary data types, how to infer condition-specific TRNs, and how to compare TRNs across conditions and species in order to understand their structure/function relationship.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bing He
- Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Genetics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA
| | - Kai Tan
- Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Genetics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA; Department of Internal Medicine, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA.
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47
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Saint-André V, Federation AJ, Lin CY, Abraham BJ, Reddy J, Lee TI, Bradner JE, Young RA. Models of human core transcriptional regulatory circuitries. Genome Res 2016; 26:385-96. [PMID: 26843070 PMCID: PMC4772020 DOI: 10.1101/gr.197590.115] [Citation(s) in RCA: 190] [Impact Index Per Article: 23.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/01/2015] [Accepted: 12/21/2015] [Indexed: 01/06/2023]
Abstract
A small set of core transcription factors (TFs) dominates control of the gene expression program in embryonic stem cells and other well-studied cellular models. These core TFs collectively regulate their own gene expression, thus forming an interconnected auto-regulatory loop that can be considered the core transcriptional regulatory circuitry (CRC) for that cell type. There is limited knowledge of core TFs, and thus models of core regulatory circuitry, for most cell types. We recently discovered that genes encoding known core TFs forming CRCs are driven by super-enhancers, which provides an opportunity to systematically predict CRCs in poorly studied cell types through super-enhancer mapping. Here, we use super-enhancer maps to generate CRC models for 75 human cell and tissue types. These core circuitry models should prove valuable for further investigating cell-type–specific transcriptional regulation in healthy and diseased cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Violaine Saint-André
- Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA
| | - Alexander J Federation
- Department of Medical Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA
| | - Charles Y Lin
- Department of Medical Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA
| | - Brian J Abraham
- Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA
| | - Jessica Reddy
- Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA; Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
| | - Tong Ihn Lee
- Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA
| | - James E Bradner
- Department of Medical Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA; Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA
| | - Richard A Young
- Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA; Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
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48
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Computational Methods for Integration of Biological Data. Per Med 2016. [DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-39349-0_8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
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49
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Abstract
Systems medicine promotes a range of approaches and strategies to study human health and disease at a systems level with the aim of improving the overall well-being of (healthy) individuals, and preventing, diagnosing, or curing disease. In this chapter we discuss how bioinformatics critically contributes to systems medicine. First, we explain the role of bioinformatics in the management and analysis of data. In particular we show the importance of publicly available biological and clinical repositories to support systems medicine studies. Second, we discuss how the integration and analysis of multiple types of omics data through integrative bioinformatics may facilitate the determination of more predictive and robust disease signatures, lead to a better understanding of (patho)physiological molecular mechanisms, and facilitate personalized medicine. Third, we focus on network analysis and discuss how gene networks can be constructed from omics data and how these networks can be decomposed into smaller modules. We discuss how the resulting modules can be used to generate experimentally testable hypotheses, provide insight into disease mechanisms, and lead to predictive models. Throughout, we provide several examples demonstrating how bioinformatics contributes to systems medicine and discuss future challenges in bioinformatics that need to be addressed to enable the advancement of systems medicine.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ulf Schmitz
- Dept of Systems Biology & Bioinformatics, University of Rostock, Rostock, Germany
| | - Olaf Wolkenhauer
- Dept of Systems Biology & Bioinformatics, University of Rostock, Rostock, Germany
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50
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Williams A, Halappanavar S. Application of biclustering of gene expression data and gene set enrichment analysis methods to identify potentially disease causing nanomaterials. BEILSTEIN JOURNAL OF NANOTECHNOLOGY 2015; 6:2438-48. [PMID: 26885455 PMCID: PMC4734442 DOI: 10.3762/bjnano.6.252] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/19/2015] [Accepted: 11/30/2015] [Indexed: 05/16/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND The presence of diverse types of nanomaterials (NMs) in commerce is growing at an exponential pace. As a result, human exposure to these materials in the environment is inevitable, necessitating the need for rapid and reliable toxicity testing methods to accurately assess the potential hazards associated with NMs. In this study, we applied biclustering and gene set enrichment analysis methods to derive essential features of altered lung transcriptome following exposure to NMs that are associated with lung-specific diseases. Several datasets from public microarray repositories describing pulmonary diseases in mouse models following exposure to a variety of substances were examined and functionally related biclusters of genes showing similar expression profiles were identified. The identified biclusters were then used to conduct a gene set enrichment analysis on pulmonary gene expression profiles derived from mice exposed to nano-titanium dioxide (nano-TiO2), carbon black (CB) or carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to determine the disease significance of these data-driven gene sets. RESULTS Biclusters representing inflammation (chemokine activity), DNA binding, cell cycle, apoptosis, reactive oxygen species (ROS) and fibrosis processes were identified. All of the NM studies were significant with respect to the bicluster related to chemokine activity (DAVID; FDR p-value = 0.032). The bicluster related to pulmonary fibrosis was enriched in studies where toxicity induced by CNT and CB studies was investigated, suggesting the potential for these materials to induce lung fibrosis. The pro-fibrogenic potential of CNTs is well established. Although CB has not been shown to induce fibrosis, it induces stronger inflammatory, oxidative stress and DNA damage responses than nano-TiO2 particles. CONCLUSION The results of the analysis correctly identified all NMs to be inflammogenic and only CB and CNTs as potentially fibrogenic. In addition to identifying several previously defined, functionally relevant gene sets, the present study also identified two novel genes sets: a gene set associated with pulmonary fibrosis and a gene set associated with ROS, underlining the advantage of using a data-driven approach to identify novel, functionally related gene sets. The results can be used in future gene set enrichment analysis studies involving NMs or as features for clustering and classifying NMs of diverse properties.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew Williams
- Environmental Health Science and Research Bureau, Environmental and Radiation Health Sciences Directorate, Health Canada, Ottawa K1A 0K9, Canada
| | - Sabina Halappanavar
- Environmental Health Science and Research Bureau, Environmental and Radiation Health Sciences Directorate, Health Canada, Ottawa K1A 0K9, Canada
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