CAREER: Integrated Approaches to Mapping Genome to Phenome

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The University of Southern California is awarded an award for the development of integrated approaches to genome to phenome mapping. The project will utilize the rapidly accumulating body of genomics data, especially the enormous amount of public microarray data, together with the associated phenotypic and environmental context information to reconstruct the biological basis of phenotypes. Traditional association studies have been relatively successful at relating genetic polymorphisms to phenotypes. However, they have met difficulties in elucidating the gene-gene interactions that contribute to complex phenotypes. Just as the genome and proteome signify all of an organism's genes and proteins, the phenome represents the entirety of its phenotypic traits. The objective of the project is to develop novel methods aimed at deriving genome-wide molecular networks of genotype-phenotype associations, termed "phenomic associations.? The project will carry out four specific activities: (1) genome-wide mapping of phenotype-specific network modules; (2) systematic reconstruction of phenotype-specific transcriptional regulatory networks; (3) phenotype prediction and computational diagnosis utilizing public genomics databases, especially the large public microarray repositories, to create an automated disease diagnosis database; and (4) development of a software/database system that will integrate genomics and phenomics analysis. The proposed research is coupled with multidisciplinary training of graduate and undergraduate students in computational genomics. A forum will created for high school biology teachers and career discussion events will be hosted for high school students. Community outreach activities will be supported by the USC Neighborhood Academic Initiative.