An Integrative Tool for Gene Regulatory Network Reconstruction Based on Microarray Data

The transcriptional regulation of gene expression has been known to be a key mechanism in the functioning of the cell and the gene expression is influenced by the transcriptional regulatory strengths. In this paper we extend the function of a former proposed gene expression analysis tool named Gene Expression Explorer to include the gene regulatory network reconstruction based on microarray data. The regulatory strengths between transcription factors and genes are implemented by a modified network component analysis method where the genes expression relationships between genes vs. tissues and transcription factors vs. tissues are adopted to explore the regulatory strengths between genes and various transcription factors. Visualized presentation of the proposed tool clearly illustrates the regulatory patterns of transcription factors for each related gene. The biologists could benefit from using this tool to analyze the gene regulatory network based on microarray data.