PathTracer Comprehensively Identifies Hypoxia-Induced Dormancy Adaptations in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Mining large-scale data to discover biologically relevant information remains a challenge despite the rapid development of bioinformatics tools. Here, we have developed a new tool, PathTracer, to identify biologically relevant information flows by mining genome-wide protein-protein interaction networks following integration of gene expression data. PathTracer successfully mines interactions between genes and traces the most perturbed paths of perceived activities under the conditions of the study. We further demonstrated the utility of this tool by identifying adaptation mechanisms of hypoxia-induced dormancy in Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb).

Automated summary

In this study, a new tool called PathTracer was developed to identify biologically relevant information flows by mining genome-wide protein-protein interaction networks integrated with gene expression data. The utility of this tool was demonstrated by identifying adaptation mechanisms of hypoxia-induced dormancy in Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb).