Computational analysis of tissue-specific combinatorial gene regulation: predicting interaction between transcription factors in human tissues

Nucleic Acids Res. 2006;34(17):4925-36. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkl595. Epub 2006 Sep 18.

Abstract

Tissue-specific gene expression is generally regulated by more than a single transcription factor (TF). Multiple TFs work in concert to achieve tissue specificity. In order to explore these complex TF interaction networks, we performed a large-scale analysis of TF interactions for 30 human tissues. We first identified tissue-specific genes for 30 tissues based on gene expression databases. We then evaluated the relationships between TFs using the relative position and co-occurrence of their binding sites in the promoters of tissue-specific genes. The predicted TF-TF interactions were validated by both known protein-protein interactions and co-expression of their target genes. We found that our predictions are enriched in known protein-protein interactions (>80 times that of random expectation). In addition, we found that the target genes show the highest co-expression in the tissue of interest. Our findings demonstrate that non-tissue specific TFs play a large role in regulation of tissue-specific genes. Furthermore, they show that individual TFs can contribute to tissue specificity in different tissues by interacting with distinct TF partners. Lastly, we identified several tissue-specific TF clusters that may play important roles in tissue-specific gene regulation.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Validation Study

MeSH terms

  • Binding Sites
  • Bone and Bones / metabolism
  • Computational Biology / methods*
  • Gene Expression Regulation*
  • Humans
  • Kidney / metabolism
  • Liver / metabolism
  • Models, Genetic*
  • Muscles / metabolism
  • Promoter Regions, Genetic
  • Transcription Factors / metabolism*

Substances

  • Transcription Factors