Does anyone know if any of the protein or DNA databases includes a field
that identifies the cell type (or types) in which the protein or gene is
expressed? I often find that even EST or cDNA records fail to identify
the cell type of origin. Occasionally, tissue-of-origin is specified,
but tissues contain a multitude of cell types, and since most libraries
are normalized, it seems to me that information on cell-type specific
expression is difficult, if not impossible, to extract. How will
integrative biologists begin to assemble the pathways and controls for a
given cell type if they cannot obtain a list of the proteins that are
expressed in the cell-type of interest?
--
Robert D. Phair, Ph.D. rphair at ix.netcom.com
BioInformatics Services http://www.webcom.com/rphair
Partnering and Outsourcing for Computational Biology
