He Ximiao, Chang Suhua, Zhang Jiajie, Zhao Qian, Xiang Haizhen, Kusonmano Kanthida, Yang Liu, Sun Zhong Sheng, Yang Huanming, Wang Jing
Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 101300, China.
Nucleic Acids Res. 2008 Jan;36(Database issue):D836-41. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkm730. Epub 2007 Sep 21.
Cancer is ranked as one of the top killers in all human diseases and continues to have a devastating effect on the population around the globe. Current research efforts are aiming to accelerate our understanding of the molecular basis of cancer and develop effective means for cancer diagnostics, treatment and prognosis. An altered pattern of epigenetic modifications, most importantly DNA methylation events, plays a critical role in tumorigenesis through regulating oncogene activation, tumor suppressor gene silencing and chromosomal instability. To study interplay of DNA methylation, gene expression and cancer, we developed a publicly accessible database for human DNA Methylation and Cancer (MethyCancer, http://methycancer.genomics.org.cn). MethyCancer hosts both highly integrated data of DNA methylation, cancer-related gene, mutation and cancer information from public resources, and the CpG Island (CGI) clones derived from our large-scale sequencing. Interconnections between different data types were analyzed and presented. Furthermore, a powerful search tool is developed to provide user-friendly access to all the data and data connections. A graphical MethyView shows DNA methylation in context of genomics and genetics data facilitating the research in cancer to understand genetic and epigenetic mechanisms that make dramatic changes in gene expression of tumor cells.
癌症位列所有人类疾病中的主要杀手之一，并且持续对全球人口产生毁灭性影响。当前的研究工作旨在加速我们对癌症分子基础的理解，并开发出癌症诊断、治疗及预后的有效方法。表观遗传修饰模式的改变，最重要的是DNA甲基化事件，通过调控癌基因激活、肿瘤抑制基因沉默和染色体不稳定性，在肿瘤发生过程中发挥关键作用。为了研究DNA甲基化、基因表达与癌症之间的相互作用，我们开发了一个可公开访问的人类DNA甲基化与癌症数据库（MethyCancer，http://methycancer.genomics.org.cn）。MethyCancer既包含来自公共资源的DNA甲基化、癌症相关基因、突变及癌症信息的高度整合数据，也包含我们大规模测序得到的CpG岛（CGI）克隆。分析并展示了不同数据类型之间的相互联系。此外，还开发了一个强大的搜索工具，以便用户友好地访问所有数据及数据连接。图形化的MethyView展示了基因组学和遗传学数据背景下的DNA甲基化情况，有助于癌症研究理解导致肿瘤细胞基因表达发生显著变化的遗传和表观遗传机制。
