title: Linkers of cell polarity and cell cycle regulation in the fission yeast protein interaction network.
abstract: The study of gene and protein interaction networks has improved our understanding of the multiple, systemic levels of regulation found in eukaryotic and prokaryotic organisms. Here we carry out a large-scale analysis of the protein-protein interaction (PPI) network of fission yeast (Schizosaccharomyces pombe) and establish a method to identify 'linker' proteins that bridge diverse cellular processes - integrating Gene Ontology and PPI data with network theory measures. We test the method on a highly characterized subset of the genome consisting of proteins controlling the cell cycle, cell polarity and cytokinesis and identify proteins likely to play a key role in controlling the temporal changes in the localization of the polarity machinery. Experimental inspection of one such factor, the polarity-regulating RNB protein Sts5, confirms the prediction that it has a cell cycle dependent regulation. Detailed bibliographic inspection of other predicted 'linkers' also confirms the predictive power of the method. As the method is robust to network perturbations and can successfully predict linker proteins, it provides a powerful tool to study the interplay between different cellular processes.
authors.affiliation: The Microsoft Research-University of Trento Centre for Computational Systems Biology, Rovereto, Italy.
authors.forename: Federico
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Vaggi
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dodgson
authors.forename: Archana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bajpai
authors.forename: Anatole
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chessel
authors.forename: Ferenc
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jordán
authors.forename: Masamitsu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sato
authors.forename: Rafael Edgardo
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Carazo-Salas
authors.forename: Attila
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Csikász-Nagy
mesh_terms: D002453:Cell Cycle / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D016764:Cell Polarity / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D019295:Computational Biology; D060066:Protein Interaction Maps; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012568:Schizosaccharomyces / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology*; D029702:Schizosaccharomyces pombe Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D015398:Signal Transduction
chemical_list: D029702:Schizosaccharomyces pombe Proteins