An interactive web application for the dissemination of human systems immunology data.

BACKGROUND: Systems immunology approaches have proven invaluable in translational research settings. The current rate at which large-scale datasets are generated presents unique challenges and opportunities. Mining aggregates of these datasets could accelerate the pace of discovery, but new solutions are needed to integrate the heterogeneous data types with the contextual information that is necessary for interpretation. In addition, enabling tools and technologies facilitating investigators' interaction with large-scale datasets must be developed in order to promote insight and foster knowledge discovery. METHODS: State of the art application programming was employed to develop an interactive web application for browsing and visualizing large and complex datasets. A collection of human immune transcriptome datasets were loaded alongside contextual information about the samples. RESULTS: We provide a resource enabling interactive query and navigation of transcriptome datasets relevant to human immunology research. Detailed information about studies and samples are displayed dynamically; if desired the associated data can be downloaded. Custom interactive visualizations of the data can be shared via email or social media. This application can be used to browse context-rich systems-scale data within and across systems immunology studies. This resource is publicly available online at [Gene Expression Browser Landing Page ( https://gxb.benaroyaresearch.org/dm3/landing.gsp )]. The source code is also available openly [Gene Expression Browser Source Code ( https://github.com/BenaroyaResearch/gxbrowser )]. CONCLUSIONS: We have developed a data browsing and visualization application capable of navigating increasingly large and complex datasets generated in the context of immunological studies. This intuitive tool ensures that, whether taken individually or as a whole, such datasets generated at great effort and expense remain interpretable and a ready source of insight for years to come.

Footprints: A Visual Search Tool that Supports Discovery and Coverage Tracking.

Searching a large document collection to learn about a broad subject involves the iterative process of figuring out what to ask, filtering the results, identifying useful documents, and deciding when one has covered enough material to stop searching. We are calling this activity "discoverage," discovery of relevant material and tracking coverage of that material. We built a visual analytic tool called Footprints that uses multiple coordinated visualizations to help users navigate through the discoverage process. To support discovery, Footprints displays topics extracted from documents that provide an overview of the search space and are used to construct searches visuospatially. Footprints allows users to triage their search results by assigning a status to each document (To Read, Read, Useful), and those status markings are shown on interactive histograms depicting the user's coverage through the documents across dates, sources, and topics. Coverage histograms help users notice biases in their search and fill any gaps in their analytic process. To create Footprints, we used a highly iterative, user-centered approach in which we conducted many evaluations during both the design and implementation stages and continually modified the design in response to feedback.

Systems scale interactive exploration reveals quantitative and qualitative differences in response to influenza and pneumococcal vaccines.

Systems immunology approaches were employed to investigate innate and adaptive immune responses to influenza and pneumococcal vaccines. These two non-live vaccines show different magnitudes of transcriptional responses at different time points after vaccination. Software solutions were developed to explore correlates of vaccine efficacy measured as antibody titers at day 28. These enabled a further dissection of transcriptional responses. Thus, the innate response, measured within hours in the peripheral blood, was dominated by an interferon transcriptional signature after influenza vaccination and by an inflammation signature after pneumococcal vaccination. Day 7 plasmablast responses induced by both vaccines was more pronounced after pneumococcal vaccination. Together, these results suggest that comparing global immune responses elicited by different vaccines will be critical to our understanding of the immune mechanisms underpinning successful vaccination.

An analysis pipeline for the inference of protein-protein interaction networks.

We present a platform for the reconstruction of protein-protein interaction networks inferred from Mass Spectrometry (MS) bait-prey data. The Software Environment for Biological Network Inference (SEBINI), an environment for the deployment of network inference algorithms that use high-throughput data, forms the platform core. Among the many algorithms available in SEBINI is the Bayesian Estimator of Probabilities of Protein-Protein Associations (BEPro3) algorithm, which is used to infer interaction networks from such MS affinity isolation data. Also, the pipeline incorporates the Collective Analysis of Biological Interaction Networks (CABIN) software. We have thus created a structured workflow for protein-protein network inference and supplemental analysis.

CABIN: collective analysis of biological interaction networks.

The importance of understanding biological interaction networks has fueled the development of numerous interaction data generation techniques, databases and prediction tools. However, not all prediction tools and databases predict interactions with one hundred percent accuracy. Generation of high-confidence interaction networks formulates the first step towards deciphering unknown protein functions, determining protein complexes and inventing drugs. The CABIN: Collective Analysis of Biological Interaction Networks software is an exploratory data analysis tool that enables analysis and integration of interactions evidence obtained from multiple sources, thereby increasing the confidence of computational predictions as well as validating experimental observations. CABIN has been written in Java and is available as a plugin for Cytoscape--an open source network visualization tool.