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Details of Award

NERC Reference : NE/K011332/1

Efficient Biological Networks Discovery and Analysis

Grant Award

Principal Investigator:
Professor LA Gasieniec, University of Liverpool, Computer Science
Co-Investigator:
Professor F Falciani, University of Liverpool, Institute of Integrative Biology
Co-Investigator:
Dr O Vasieva, Ingenet Limited, Head Office
Science Area:
Atmospheric
Earth
Freshwater
Marine
Terrestrial
Overall Classification:
Atmospheric
ENRIs:
Biodiversity
Environmental Risks and Hazards
Global Change
Natural Resource Management
Pollution and Waste
Science Topics:
Functional genomics
Metabolomics / Metabonomics
Proteomics
Transcriptomics
Bioinformatics
Abstract:
The hopping PhD student will spend six months in the CCBM in the IIB at Liverpool University, working closely with pure biologists and computational biologists. The main purpose of this placement will be to acquire by the discipline hopper good understanding of biological networks. This project will be used also to set foundation for further development of respective computational tools and to liaison research collaboration between the two research groups in Algorithms and Systems Biology and their respective collaborators. The main research challenges to be addressed within this projects include: 1) NETWORK MODULARIZATION: Network modularization consists in the identification of a portion of large network that share certain characteristics. Most of the available methods that perform well use a definition of network module based on connectivity. Some of the more advanced approaches instead aim at integrating multi-level information (e.g. agglomeration of several gene properties and gene relation- ships in the module search) within a module and are therefore more suitable for representing biological complexity. Unfortunately, these tend to perform well inl small networks (<1000 nodes) and they either fail for larger networks, which are of real interests to biologists. In search for efficient solutions we will look into new promissing clustering methods. The group lead by Prof Gasieniec (PI) currently develops a tool "Graph Draw" designed for analysis of real datasets gathered from a wide range of social networking mediums and manipulates the layout of the data in order to produce meaningful representation of information, from which can be analysed to achieve some specific goals. Metrics used in Graph Draw include degree centrality, closeness centrality, betweenness centrality, page rank, transitivity, amongst others. This joint project is expected to build further on the success of Graph Draw in the context of complex biological networks analysis. 2) NETWORK VISUALISATION: The visualization and the visual analysis of biological networks are one of the key analysis techniques to cope with the enormous amount of data. In particular, the layout of networks should be in agreement with biological drawing conventions and should be adopted [19]. In general, visualization methods for the life sciences should allow for the layout and navigation of biological networks for both their static presentation as well as their interactive exploration. Such methods need to adhere to constraints that originate from recognized textbook and poster layouts from generally accepted drawing conventions within the life-science community as well as from standardization initiatives such as MIM (Molecular Interaction Maps) and SBGN (Systems Biology Graphical Notation). The Graph Draw tool provides also some visualisation based on force-directed graph drawing algorithms. Further extensions including mutilayer presentation and animation are sought also within this project.
Period of Award:
1 May 2013 - 31 Oct 2013
Value:
£45,294
Authorised funds only
NERC Reference:
NE/K011332/1
Grant Stage:
Completed
Scheme:
Directed (RP) - NR1
Grant Status:
Closed
Programme:
Omics

This grant award has a total value of £45,294  

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FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)

DI - Other CostsIndirect - Indirect CostsDA - InvestigatorsDA - Estate CostsDI - T&S
£15,088£5,042£17,632£1,080£6,452

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