MetDisease--connecting metabolites to diseases via literature.
BACKGROUND
In recent years, metabolomics has emerged as an approach to perform large-scale characterization of small molecules in biological systems. Metabolomics posed a number of bioinformatics challenges associated in data analysis and interpretation. Genome-based metabolic reconstructions have established a powerful framework for connecting metabolites to genes through metabolic reactions and enzymes that catalyze them. Pathway databases and bioinformatics tools that use this framework have proven to be useful for annotating experimental metabolomics data. This framework can be used to infer connections between metabolites and diseases through annotated disease genes. However, only about half of experimentally detected metabolites can be mapped to canonical metabolic pathways. We present a new Cytoscape 3 plug-in, MetDisease, which uses an alternative approach to link metabolites to disease information. MetDisease uses Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) disease terms mapped to PubChem compounds through literature to annotate compound networks.


METHODS
MetDisease can be downloaded from http://apps.cytoscape.org/apps/metdisease or installed via the Cytoscape app manager. Further information about MetDisease can be found at http://metdisease.ncibi.org


BACKGROUND
akarnovs@med.umich.edu


BACKGROUND
Supplementary Data are available at Bioinformatics online.
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
William
W
Duren
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Terry
T
Weymouth
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Tim
T
Hull
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Gilbert S
GS
Omenn
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Brian
B
Athey
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Charles
C
Burant
Department of Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA and Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Alla
A
Karnovsky
D062126:Databases, Chemical; D004194:Disease / Q000235:genetics*; D015894:Genome, Human / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D046650:Medical Subject Headings; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways; D055432:Metabolomics / Q000379:methods*; D012984:Software