Search bioRxiv⌕ Search

Biology subjects

Iyer, B.

Publications and source records attributed to Iyer, B..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

maxATAC: genome-scale transcription-factor binding prediction from ATAC-seq with deep neural networks

Transcription factors read the genome, fundamentally connecting DNA sequence to gene expression across diverse cell types. Determining how, where, and when TFs bind chromatin will advance our understanding of gene regulatory networks and cellular behavior. The 2017 ENCODE-DREAM in vivo Transcription-Factor Binding Site (TFBS) Prediction Challenge highlighted the value of chromatin accessibility data to TFBS prediction, establishing state-of-the- art methods for TFBS prediction from DNase-seq. However, the more recent Assay-for- Transposase-Accessible-Chromatin (ATAC)-seq has surpassed DNase-seq as the most widely- used chromatin accessibility profiling method. Furthermore, ATAC-seq is the only such technique available at single-cell resolution from standard commercial platforms. While ATAC-seq datasets grow exponentially, suboptimal motif scanning is unfortunately the most common method for TFBS prediction from ATAC-seq. To enable community access to state-of-the-art TFBS prediction from ATAC-seq, we (1) curated an extensive benchmark dataset (127 TFs) for ATAC-seq model training and (2) built "maxATAC", a suite of user-friendly, deep neural network models for genome-wide TFBS prediction from ATAC-seq in any cell type. With models available for 127 human TFs, maxATAC is the first collection of high-performance TFBS prediction models for ATAC-seq. maxATAC performance extends to primary cells and single-cell ATAC-seq, enabling improved TFBS prediction in vivo. We demonstrate maxATACs capabilities by identifying TFBS associated with allele-dependent chromatin accessibility at atopic dermatitis genetic risk loci. Author SummaryProteins called transcription factors interpret the genome, reading both DNA sequence and chromatin state, to orchestrate gene expression across the diversity of human cell types. In any given cell type, most chromatin is "inaccessible", and only those parts of the genetic code needed or likely to be needed soon are "accessible" for transcription factor binding to affect gene expression and cellular behavior. Hundreds of transcription factors are expressed in a given cell type and context (e.g., age, disease), and knowledge of their context-specific DNA binding sites is key to uncovering how transcription factors regulate cellular behaviors in health or disease. However, experimentally profiling the >1,600 human transcription factors across all cell types and contexts is infeasible. We built a suite of computational models "maxATAC" to predict transcription factor binding from a measurement of accessible chromatin, ATAC-seq. Importantly, ATAC-seq is feasible even at single-cell resolution. Thus, this data type, in combination with maxATAC, can be used to infer transcription factor binding sites in directly-relevant cell types isolated from physiological and disease settings, enabling insights into disease mechanisms, including how genetic variants and cellular context impact transcription factor binding, gene expression patterns and disease risk.

bioinformatics↗

LungMAP Portal Ecosystem: Systems-Level Exploration of the Lung

An improved understanding of the human lung necessitates advanced systems models informed by an ever-increasing repertoire of molecular omics, cellular, imaging and pathological datasets. To centralize and standardize information across broad lung research efforts we expanded the LungMAP.net website into a gateway portal. This portal connects a broad-spectrum of research networks, bulk and single-cell multi-omics data and a diverse collection of image data that span mammalian lung development and disease. The data are standardized across species and technologies using harmonized data and metadata models that leverage recent advances including those from the Human Cell Atlas, diverse ontologies, and the LungMAP CellCards initiative. To cultivate future discoveries, we have aggregated a diverse collection of single-cell atlases for multiple species (human, rhesus, mouse), to enable consistent queries across technologies, cohorts, age, disease and drug treatment. These atlases are provided as independent and integrated queriable datasets, with an emphasis on dynamic visualization, figure generation and reference-based classification of user-provided datasets (Azimuth). As this resource grows, we intend to increase the breadth of available interactive interfaces, data portals and datasets from LungMAP and external research efforts.

systems biology↗

DeepImmuno: Deep learning-empowered prediction and generation of immunogenic peptides for T cell immunity

T-cells play an essential role in the adaptive immune system by seeking out, binding and destroying foreign antigens presented on the cell surface of diseased cells. An improved understanding of T-cell immunity will greatly aid in the development of new cancer immunotherapies and vaccines for life threatening pathogens. Central to the design of such targeted therapies are computational methods to predict non-native epitopes to elicit a T cell response, however, we currently lack accurate immunogenicity inference methods. Another challenge is the ability to accurately simulate immunogenic peptides for specific human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles, for both synthetic biological applications and to augment real training datasets. Here, we proposed a beta-binomial distribution approach to derive epitope immunogenic potential from sequence alone. We conducted systematic benchmarking of five traditional machine learning (ElasticNet, KNN, SVM, Random Forest, AdaBoost) and three deep learning models (CNN, ResNet, GNN) using three independent prior validated immunogenic peptide collections (dengue virus, cancer neoantigen and SARS-Cov-2). We chose the CNN model as the best prediction model based on its adaptivity for small and large datasets, and performance relative to existing methods. In addition to outperforming two highly used immunogenicity prediction algorithms, DeepHLApan and IEDB, DeepImmuno-CNN further correctly predicts which residues are most important for T cell antigen recognition. Our independent generative adversarial network (GAN) approach, DeepImmuno-GAN, was further able to accurately simulate immunogenic peptides with physiochemical properties and immunogenicity predictions similar to that of real antigens. We provide DeepImmuno-CNN as source code and an easy-to-use web interface. Data AvailabilityDeepImmuno Python3 code is available at https://github.com/frankligy/DeepImmuno. The DeepImmuno web portal is available from https://deepimmuno.herokuapp.com. The data in this article is available in GitHub and supplementary materials.

bioinformatics↗