Linking genes to the developmental processes they are involved in is complex, both experimentally and computationally. GXD-search implements a bioinformatics approach for identifying such groups in the transcriptomes of sets of developing mouse tissues undergoing a particular process. It has been used to examine the genetic basis of the mesenchyme-to-epithelial transition.
Results: For the mesenchyme-to-epithelial transitions, analysis shows that the data in GXD are sufficient only to identify six transcription factors, Cited1, Cited2, Meox1, Lhx1, Foxc1 and Foxc2, together with CRABP1, a protein that sequesters retinoic acid, that are usually expressed just before the transition occurs. Further analysis indicates that this set of genes is jointly expressed in no other tissues and they are thus candidate transcription factors.
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GXD-search Mac OS X applicationGXD-search tar file (all platforms)
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