臨床および医療ゲノミクスジャーナル

Reverse Direction Method: A Possible Tool to Link Animal Models with Corresponding Human Diseases and Disorders

Abstract

Rajeev Singh, Toru Atsumi, Hidenori Bando, Masaya Harada, Akihiro Nakamura, Moe Yamada, Jing-Jing Jiang, Hironao Suzuki, Koukiti Katsunuma, Takao Nodomi, Daisuke Kamimura, Hideki Ogura and Masaaki Murakami

Animal models are integral to our understanding of the cellular and molecular pathogenesis of human diseases and disorders. Functional genome-wide methods such as DNA microarray and RNA interference-based highthroughput screening have recently emerged as powerful tools for such studies. However, genomic results from animal models may not necessarily correspond to the pathogenesis in humans. Thus, there is a need for new methods that better correlate the data from these models with human disease and disorders. Here we describe the reverse direction method, which combines the in vitro data of genome-wide screening of animal models with the data from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of human diseases and disorders to effectively link the results of the two. This review introduces the concept of the reverse direction method when applied to the study of the inflammation amplifier, a chemokine inducer in non-immune cells for the development of chronic inflammatory diseases.