title: Bioinformatics and cancer target discovery.
abstract: The convergence of genomic technologies and the development of drugs designed against specific molecular targets provides many opportunities for using bioinformatics to bridge the gap between biological knowledge and clinical therapy. Identifying genes that have properties similar to known targets is conceptually straightforward. Additionally, genes can be linked to cancer via recurrent genomic or genetic abnormalities. Finally, by integrating large and disparate datasets, gene-level distinctions can be made between the different biological states that the data represents. These bioinformatics approaches and their associated methodologies, which can be applied across a range of technologies, facilitate the rapid identification of new target leads for further experimental validation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Bioinformatics, Genentech, 1 DNA Way, M.S. 93, South San Francisco, CA 94080, USA.
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Desany
authors.forename: Zemin
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000379:methods*; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D021141:Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D017421:Sequence Analysis / Q000379:methods