Research Sheds Light on NIH Tools Facilitate Matching Cancer Drugs With Gene Targets

The way in which a suite of web-based tools provides the research community with greatly improved capacity to compare data derived from large collections of genomic information against thousands of drugs has been detailed in a new study. By comparing drugs and genetic targets, researchers can more easily identify pharmaceuticals that could be effective against different forms of cancer.

The newly updated software, called CellMiner, was built for use with the NCI-60, one of the most widely utilized collections of cancer cell samples employed in the testing of potential anti-cancer drugs. The tools, available free, provide rapid access to data from 22,379 genes catalogued in the NCI-60 and from 20,503 previously analyzed chemical compounds, including 102 U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs.

The study, written by the scientists that developed the tools at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, appeared in the July 16, 2012, issue of Cancer Research.

"Previously you would have to hire a bioinformatics team to sort through all of the data, but these tools put the entire database at the fingertips of any researcher," explained Yves Pommier, M.D., Ph.D., of the NCI's Center for Cancer Research. "These tools allow researchers to analyze drug responses as well as make comparisons from drug to drug and gene to gene."



Source-Eurekalert