Archived Talks

University of Pittsburgh Department of Biomedical Informatics Lecture Series

“Human Gene Loss as it Applies to Xenotransplantation Epitope Identification”
Kevin McDade, MS
Biomedical Informatics Certificate Fellow

“Voice Recognition and Natural Language Processing for Dental Exams”
Jeannie Yuhaniak Irwin, MS
Biomedical Informatics Doctoral Fellow

Friday, January 25, 2008
11:00 AM to 12:00 NOON
Parkvale Building (200 Meyran Avenue), Classroom M-184 (on the mezzanine level) or via video conference in Cancer Pavilion, Room 341

Abstract (McDade): Xenotransplantation is a procedure that can solve the organ shortage problem encountered by patients with end-stage organ failure. Hyperacute rejection occurs due to the presence of alpha 1,3 galactosyltransferase on pig organs. Knockout pigs with no alpha 1,3 galactosyltransferase expression still result in acute rejection due to 'non-Gal' protein expression. The mouse proteome was used in this study as a source organism to provide a list of mouse-human proteins with no functional orthologs, with the human counterpart target being an inactive protein. Public databases such as Ensembl, Entrez, and ExPasy were used to conduct a comparative approach in the search for these inactivated human psuedogenes. In addition secondary protein modifications such as transmembrane, signal peptides, glycosylation, and protein functionality were determined in analysis of the candidate proteins. The analysis revealed 50 transmembrane and one signal anchor that are candidates for a xenotransplantation epitope. Notable proteins that were identified were mouse intectin and ADP-ribosyltransferase 2b. Upon completion of a reliable pig genome draft, these 51 candidates may be identified as xenotransplantion epitopes.

For more information: jxc3@pitt.edu or 412.647.7113