Improving Interpretation of Cardiac Phenotypes and Enhancing Discovery With Expanded Knowledge in the Gene Ontology.

Authors

Ruth C Lovering
Paola Roncaglia
Douglas G Howe
Stanley J F Laulederkind
Varsha K Khodiyar
Tanya Z Berardini
Susan Tweedie
Rebecca E Foulger
David Osumi-Sutherland
Nancy H Campbell
Rachael P Huntley
Philippa J Talmud
Judith A. Blake, The Jackson LaboratoryFollow
Ross Breckenridge
Paul R Riley
Pier D Lambiase
Perry M Elliott
Lucie Clapp
Andrew Tinker
David P. Hill, The Jackson LaboratoryFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2-2018

JAX Source

Circ Genom Precis Med 2018 Feb; 11(2):e001813

Volume

11

Issue

2

First Page

001813

Last Page

001813

ISSN

2574-8300

PMID

29440116

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1161/CIRCGEN.117.001813

Grant

HG002273

Abstract

BACKGROUND: A systems biology approach to cardiac physiology requires a comprehensive representation of how coordinated processes operate in the heart, as well as the ability to interpret relevant transcriptomic and proteomic experiments. The Gene Ontology (GO) Consortium provides structured, controlled vocabularies of biological terms that can be used to summarize and analyze functional knowledge for gene products.

METHODS AND RESULTS: In this study, we created a computational resource to facilitate genetic studies of cardiac physiology by integrating literature curation with attention to an improved and expanded ontological representation of heart processes in the Gene Ontology. As a result, the Gene Ontology now contains terms that comprehensively describe the roles of proteins in cardiac muscle cell action potential, electrical coupling, and the transmission of the electrical impulse from the sinoatrial node to the ventricles. Evaluating the effectiveness of this approach to inform data analysis demonstrated that Gene Ontology annotations, analyzed within an expanded ontological context of heart processes, can help to identify candidate genes associated with arrhythmic disease risk loci.

CONCLUSIONS: We determined that a combination of curation and ontology development for heart-specific genes and processes supports the identification and downstream analysis of genes responsible for the spread of the cardiac action potential through the heart. Annotating these genes and processes in a structured format facilitates data analysis and supports effective retrieval of gene-centric information about cardiac defects.

Circ Genom Precis Med 2018 Feb; 11(2):e001813.

Comments

Open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.

Recommended Citation

Lovering R, Roncaglia P, Howe D, Laulederkind S, Khodiyar V, Berardini T, Tweedie S, Foulger R, Osumi-Sutherland D, Campbell N, Huntley R, Talmud P, Blake JA, Breckenridge R, Riley P, Lambiase P, Elliott P, Clapp L, Tinker A, Hill DP. Improving Interpretation of Cardiac Phenotypes and Enhancing Discovery With Expanded Knowledge in the Gene Ontology. Circ Genom Precis Med 2018 Feb; 11(2):e001813