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  1. Article ; Online: SPINNAKER: an R-based tool to highlight key RNA interactions in complex biological networks.

    Paci, Paola / Fiscon, Giulia

    BMC bioinformatics

    2022  Volume 23, Issue 1, Page(s) 166

    Abstract: Background: Recently, we developed a mathematical model for identifying putative competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) interactions. This methodology has aroused a broad acknowledgment within the scientific community thanks to the encouraging results ... ...

    Abstract Background: Recently, we developed a mathematical model for identifying putative competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) interactions. This methodology has aroused a broad acknowledgment within the scientific community thanks to the encouraging results achieved when applied to breast invasive carcinoma, leading to the identification of PVT1, a long non-coding RNA functioning as ceRNA for the miR-200 family. The main shortcoming of the model is that it is no freely available and implemented in MATLAB®, a proprietary programming platform requiring a paid license for installing, operating, manipulating, and running the software.
    Results: Breaking through these model limitations demands to distribute it in an open-source, freely accessible environment, such as R, designed for an ordinary audience of users that are not able to afford a proprietary solution. Here, we present SPINNAKER (SPongeINteractionNetworkmAKER), the open-source version of our widely established mathematical model for predicting ceRNAs crosstalk, that is released as an exhaustive collection of R functions. SPINNAKER has been even designed for providing many additional features that facilitate its usability, make it more efficient in terms of further implementation and extension, and less intense in terms of computational execution time.
    Conclusions: SPINNAKER source code is freely available at https://github.com/sportingCode/SPINNAKER.git together with a thoroughgoing PPT-based guideline. In order to help users get the key points more conveniently, also a practical R-styled plain-text guideline is provided. Finally, a short movie is available to help the user to set the own directory, properly.
    MeSH term(s) Breast Neoplasms/genetics ; Female ; Gene Regulatory Networks ; Humans ; MicroRNAs/genetics ; Models, Theoretical ; RNA, Long Noncoding/genetics ; RNA, Messenger/genetics ; Software
    Chemical Substances MicroRNAs ; RNA, Long Noncoding ; RNA, Messenger
    Language English
    Publishing date 2022-05-06
    Publishing country England
    Document type Journal Article
    ZDB-ID 2041484-5
    ISSN 1471-2105 ; 1471-2105
    ISSN (online) 1471-2105
    ISSN 1471-2105
    DOI 10.1186/s12859-022-04695-x
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  2. Article ; Online: Circular RNA mediated gene regulation in human breast cancer: A bioinformatics analysis.

    Fiscon, Giulia / Funari, Alessio / Paci, Paola

    PloS one

    2023  Volume 18, Issue 7, Page(s) e0289051

    Abstract: Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a new acknowledged class of RNAs that has been shown to play a major role in several biological functions both in physiological and pathological conditions, operating as critical part of regulatory processes, like competing ... ...

    Abstract Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a new acknowledged class of RNAs that has been shown to play a major role in several biological functions both in physiological and pathological conditions, operating as critical part of regulatory processes, like competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) networks. The ceRNA hypothesis is a recently discovered molecular mechanism that adds a new key layer of post-transcriptional regulation, whereby various types of RNAs can reciprocally influence each other's expression competing for binding the same pool of microRNAs, even affecting disease development. In this study, we build a network of circRNA-miRNA-mRNA interactions in human breast cancer, called CERNOMA, that is a bipartite graph with one class of nodes corresponding to differentially expressed miRNAs (DEMs) and the other one corresponding to differentially expressed circRNAs (DEC) and mRNAs (DEGs). A link between a DEC (or DEG) and DEM is placed if it is predicted to be a target of the DEM and shows an opposite expression level trend with respect to the DEM. Within the CERNOMA, we highlighted an interesting deregulated circRNA-miRNA-mRNA triplet, including the up-regulated hsa_circRNA_102908 (BRCA1 associated RING domain 1), the down-regulated miR-410-3p, and the up-regulated ESM1, whose overexpression has been already shown to promote tumor dissemination and metastasis in breast cancer.
    MeSH term(s) Humans ; Female ; RNA, Circular/genetics ; Breast Neoplasms/genetics ; MicroRNAs/genetics ; MicroRNAs/metabolism ; RNA, Messenger/genetics ; RNA, Messenger/metabolism ; Computational Biology ; Gene Regulatory Networks
    Chemical Substances RNA, Circular ; MicroRNAs ; RNA, Messenger ; MIRN410 microRNA, human
    Language English
    Publishing date 2023-07-26
    Publishing country United States
    Document type Journal Article ; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
    ZDB-ID 2267670-3
    ISSN 1932-6203 ; 1932-6203
    ISSN (online) 1932-6203
    ISSN 1932-6203
    DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0289051
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  3. Article ; Online: SPINNAKER

    Paola Paci / Giulia Fiscon

    BMC Bioinformatics, Vol 23, Iss 1, Pp 1-

    an R-based tool to highlight key RNA interactions in complex biological networks

    2022  Volume 13

    Abstract: Abstract Background Recently, we developed a mathematical model for identifying putative competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) interactions. This methodology has aroused a broad acknowledgment within the scientific community thanks to the encouraging results ... ...

    Abstract Abstract Background Recently, we developed a mathematical model for identifying putative competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) interactions. This methodology has aroused a broad acknowledgment within the scientific community thanks to the encouraging results achieved when applied to breast invasive carcinoma, leading to the identification of PVT1, a long non-coding RNA functioning as ceRNA for the miR-200 family. The main shortcoming of the model is that it is no freely available and implemented in MATLAB®, a proprietary programming platform requiring a paid license for installing, operating, manipulating, and running the software. Results Breaking through these model limitations demands to distribute it in an open-source, freely accessible environment, such as R, designed for an ordinary audience of users that are not able to afford a proprietary solution. Here, we present SPINNAKER (SPongeINteractionNetworkmAKER), the open-source version of our widely established mathematical model for predicting ceRNAs crosstalk, that is released as an exhaustive collection of R functions. SPINNAKER has been even designed for providing many additional features that facilitate its usability, make it more efficient in terms of further implementation and extension, and less intense in terms of computational execution time. Conclusions SPINNAKER source code is freely available at https://github.com/sportingCode/SPINNAKER.git together with a thoroughgoing PPT-based guideline. In order to help users get the key points more conveniently, also a practical R-styled plain-text guideline is provided. Finally, a short movie is available to help the user to set the own directory, properly.
    Keywords Algorithms ; ceRNA network ; Network theory ; miRNA sponge ; Computer applications to medicine. Medical informatics ; R858-859.7 ; Biology (General) ; QH301-705.5
    Subject code 004
    Language English
    Publishing date 2022-05-01T00:00:00Z
    Publisher BMC
    Document type Article ; Online
    Database BASE - Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (life sciences selection)

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  4. Article ; Online: SAveRUNNER: an R-based tool for drug repurposing.

    Fiscon, Giulia / Paci, Paola

    BMC bioinformatics

    2021  Volume 22, Issue 1, Page(s) 150

    Abstract: Background: Currently, no proven effective drugs for the novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 exist and despite widespread vaccination campaigns, we are far short from herd immunity. The number of people who are still vulnerable to the virus is too high ... ...

    Abstract Background: Currently, no proven effective drugs for the novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 exist and despite widespread vaccination campaigns, we are far short from herd immunity. The number of people who are still vulnerable to the virus is too high to hamper new outbreaks, leading a compelling need to find new therapeutic options devoted to combat SARS-CoV-2 infection. Drug repurposing represents an effective drug discovery strategy from existing drugs that could shorten the time and reduce the cost compared to de novo drug discovery.
    Results: We developed a network-based tool for drug repurposing provided as a freely available R-code, called SAveRUNNER (Searching off-lAbel dRUg aNd NEtwoRk), with the aim to offer a promising framework to efficiently detect putative novel indications for currently marketed drugs against diseases of interest. SAveRUNNER predicts drug-disease associations by quantifying the interplay between the drug targets and the disease-associated proteins in the human interactome through the computation of a novel network-based similarity measure, which prioritizes associations between drugs and diseases located in the same network neighborhoods.
    Conclusions: The algorithm was successfully applied to predict off-label drugs to be repositioned against the new human coronavirus (2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2), and it achieved a high accuracy in the identification of well-known drug indications, thus revealing itself as a powerful tool to rapidly detect potential novel medical indications for various drugs that are worth of further investigation. SAveRUNNER source code is freely available at https://github.com/giuliafiscon/SAveRUNNER.git , along with a comprehensive user guide.
    MeSH term(s) Antiviral Agents/pharmacology ; COVID-19 ; Drug Repositioning ; Humans ; Off-Label Use ; SARS-CoV-2/drug effects ; Software
    Chemical Substances Antiviral Agents
    Language English
    Publishing date 2021-03-23
    Publishing country England
    Document type Journal Article
    ZDB-ID 2041484-5
    ISSN 1471-2105 ; 1471-2105
    ISSN (online) 1471-2105
    ISSN 1471-2105
    DOI 10.1186/s12859-021-04076-w
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  5. Article ; Online: SWIMmeR: an R-based software to unveiling crucial nodes in complex biological networks.

    Paci, Paola / Fiscon, Giulia

    Bioinformatics (Oxford, England)

    2021  Volume 38, Issue 2, Page(s) 586–588

    Abstract: Summary: We present SWIMmeR, an open-source version of its predecessor SWIM (SWitchMiner) that is a network-based tool for mining key (switch) genes that are associated with intriguing patterns of molecular co-abundance and may play a crucial role in ... ...

    Abstract Summary: We present SWIMmeR, an open-source version of its predecessor SWIM (SWitchMiner) that is a network-based tool for mining key (switch) genes that are associated with intriguing patterns of molecular co-abundance and may play a crucial role in phenotypic transitions in various biological settings. SWIM was originally written in MATLAB®, a proprietary programming language that requires the purchase of a license to install, manipulate, operate and run the software. Over the last years, SWIM has sparked a widespread interest within the scientific community thanks to the promising results obtained through its application in a broad range of phenotype-specific scenarios, spanning from complex diseases to grapevine berry maturation. This success has created the call for it to be distributed in a freely accessible, open-source, runtime environment, such as R, aimed at a general audience of non-expert users that cannot afford the leading proprietary solution. SWIMmeR is provided as a comprehensive collection of R functions and it also includes several additional features that make it less intensive in terms of computer time and more efficient in terms of usability and further implementation and extension.
    Availability and implementation: The SWIMmeR source code is freely available at https://github.com/sportingCode/SWIMmeR.git, along with a practical user guide, including a usage example of its application on breast cancer dataset.
    Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
    MeSH term(s) Software ; Programming Languages
    Language English
    Publishing date 2021-07-16
    Publishing country England
    Document type Journal Article ; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
    ZDB-ID 1422668-6
    ISSN 1367-4811 ; 1367-4803
    ISSN (online) 1367-4811
    ISSN 1367-4803
    DOI 10.1093/bioinformatics/btab657
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  6. Article ; Online: Hepatitis B Virus and microRNAs: A Bioinformatics Approach.

    Zulian, Verdiana / Fiscon, Giulia / Paci, Paola / Garbuglia, Anna Rosa

    International journal of molecular sciences

    2023  Volume 24, Issue 24

    Abstract: In recent decades, microRNAs (miRNAs) have emerged as key regulators of gene expression, and the identification of viral miRNAs (v-miRNAs) within some viruses, including hepatitis B virus (HBV), has attracted significant attention. HBV infections often ... ...

    Abstract In recent decades, microRNAs (miRNAs) have emerged as key regulators of gene expression, and the identification of viral miRNAs (v-miRNAs) within some viruses, including hepatitis B virus (HBV), has attracted significant attention. HBV infections often progress to chronic states (CHB) and may induce fibrosis/cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The presence of HBV can dysregulate host miRNA expression, influencing several biological pathways, such as apoptosis, innate and immune response, viral replication, and pathogenesis. Consequently, miRNAs are considered a promising biomarker for diagnostic, prognostic, and treatment response. The dynamics of miRNAs during HBV infection are multifaceted, influenced by host variability and miRNA interactions. Given the ability of miRNAs to target multiple messenger RNA (mRNA), understanding the viral-host (human) interplay is complex but essential to develop novel clinical applications. Therefore, bioinformatics can help to analyze, identify, and interpret a vast amount of miRNA data. This review explores the bioinformatics tools available for viral and host miRNA research. Moreover, we introduce a brief overview focusing on the role of miRNAs during HBV infection. In this way, this review aims to help the selection of the most appropriate bioinformatics tools based on requirements and research goals.
    MeSH term(s) Humans ; Hepatitis B virus ; MicroRNAs/genetics ; MicroRNAs/metabolism ; Carcinoma, Hepatocellular/metabolism ; Liver Neoplasms/metabolism ; Hepatitis B/genetics ; Computational Biology ; Hepatitis B, Chronic
    Chemical Substances MicroRNAs
    Language English
    Publishing date 2023-12-07
    Publishing country Switzerland
    Document type Journal Article ; Review
    ZDB-ID 2019364-6
    ISSN 1422-0067 ; 1422-0067 ; 1661-6596
    ISSN (online) 1422-0067
    ISSN 1422-0067 ; 1661-6596
    DOI 10.3390/ijms242417224
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  7. Article ; Online: A Comparison of Network-Based Methods for Drug Repurposing along with an Application to Human Complex Diseases.

    Fiscon, Giulia / Conte, Federica / Farina, Lorenzo / Paci, Paola

    International journal of molecular sciences

    2022  Volume 23, Issue 7

    Abstract: Drug repurposing strategy, proposing a therapeutic switching of already approved drugs with known medical indications to new therapeutic purposes, has been considered as an efficient approach to unveil novel drug candidates with new pharmacological ... ...

    Abstract Drug repurposing strategy, proposing a therapeutic switching of already approved drugs with known medical indications to new therapeutic purposes, has been considered as an efficient approach to unveil novel drug candidates with new pharmacological activities, significantly reducing the cost and shortening the time of de novo drug discovery. Meaningful computational approaches for drug repurposing exploit the principles of the emerging field of Network Medicine, according to which human diseases can be interpreted as local perturbations of the human interactome network, where the molecular determinants of each disease (disease genes) are not randomly scattered, but co-localized in highly interconnected subnetworks (disease modules), whose perturbation is linked to the pathophenotype manifestation. By interpreting drug effects as local perturbations of the interactome, for a drug to be on-target effective against a specific disease or to cause off-target adverse effects, its targets should be in the nearby of disease-associated genes. Here, we used the network-based proximity measure to compute the distance between the drug module and the disease module in the human interactome by exploiting five different metrics (minimum, maximum, mean, median, mode), with the aim to compare different frameworks for highlighting putative repurposable drugs to treat complex human diseases, including malignant breast and prostate neoplasms, schizophrenia, and liver cirrhosis. Whilst the standard metric (that is the minimum) for the network-based proximity remained a valid tool for efficiently screening off-label drugs, we observed that the other implemented metrics specifically predicted further interesting drug candidates worthy of investigation for yielding a potentially significant clinical benefit.
    MeSH term(s) Computational Biology/methods ; Drug Discovery ; Drug Repositioning/methods ; Humans
    Language English
    Publishing date 2022-03-28
    Publishing country Switzerland
    Document type Journal Article
    ZDB-ID 2019364-6
    ISSN 1422-0067 ; 1422-0067 ; 1661-6596
    ISSN (online) 1422-0067
    ISSN 1422-0067 ; 1661-6596
    DOI 10.3390/ijms23073703
    Database MEDical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System OnLINE

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  8. Article ; Online: SAveRUNNER

    Giulia Fiscon / Paola Paci

    BMC Bioinformatics, Vol 22, Iss 1, Pp 1-

    an R-based tool for drug repurposing

    2021  Volume 10

    Abstract: Abstract Background Currently, no proven effective drugs for the novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 exist and despite widespread vaccination campaigns, we are far short from herd immunity. The number of people who are still vulnerable to the virus is too ...

    Abstract Abstract Background Currently, no proven effective drugs for the novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 exist and despite widespread vaccination campaigns, we are far short from herd immunity. The number of people who are still vulnerable to the virus is too high to hamper new outbreaks, leading a compelling need to find new therapeutic options devoted to combat SARS-CoV-2 infection. Drug repurposing represents an effective drug discovery strategy from existing drugs that could shorten the time and reduce the cost compared to de novo drug discovery. Results We developed a network-based tool for drug repurposing provided as a freely available R-code, called SAveRUNNER (Searching off-lAbel dRUg aNd NEtwoRk), with the aim to offer a promising framework to efficiently detect putative novel indications for currently marketed drugs against diseases of interest. SAveRUNNER predicts drug–disease associations by quantifying the interplay between the drug targets and the disease-associated proteins in the human interactome through the computation of a novel network-based similarity measure, which prioritizes associations between drugs and diseases located in the same network neighborhoods. Conclusions The algorithm was successfully applied to predict off-label drugs to be repositioned against the new human coronavirus (2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2), and it achieved a high accuracy in the identification of well-known drug indications, thus revealing itself as a powerful tool to rapidly detect potential novel medical indications for various drugs that are worth of further investigation. SAveRUNNER source code is freely available at https://github.com/giuliafiscon/SAveRUNNER.git , along with a comprehensive user guide.
    Keywords Drug repurposing ; Network theory ; Network medicine ; Computer applications to medicine. Medical informatics ; R858-859.7 ; Biology (General) ; QH301-705.5
    Subject code 006
    Language English
    Publishing date 2021-03-01T00:00:00Z
    Publisher BMC
    Document type Article ; Online
    Database BASE - Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (life sciences selection)

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  9. Article ; Online: Hepatitis B Virus and microRNAs

    Verdiana Zulian / Giulia Fiscon / Paola Paci / Anna Rosa Garbuglia

    International Journal of Molecular Sciences, Vol 24, Iss 24, p

    A Bioinformatics Approach

    2023  Volume 17224

    Abstract: In recent decades, microRNAs (miRNAs) have emerged as key regulators of gene expression, and the identification of viral miRNAs (v-miRNAs) within some viruses, including hepatitis B virus (HBV), has attracted significant attention. HBV infections often ... ...

    Abstract In recent decades, microRNAs (miRNAs) have emerged as key regulators of gene expression, and the identification of viral miRNAs (v-miRNAs) within some viruses, including hepatitis B virus (HBV), has attracted significant attention. HBV infections often progress to chronic states (CHB) and may induce fibrosis/cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The presence of HBV can dysregulate host miRNA expression, influencing several biological pathways, such as apoptosis, innate and immune response, viral replication, and pathogenesis. Consequently, miRNAs are considered a promising biomarker for diagnostic, prognostic, and treatment response. The dynamics of miRNAs during HBV infection are multifaceted, influenced by host variability and miRNA interactions. Given the ability of miRNAs to target multiple messenger RNA (mRNA), understanding the viral–host (human) interplay is complex but essential to develop novel clinical applications. Therefore, bioinformatics can help to analyze, identify, and interpret a vast amount of miRNA data. This review explores the bioinformatics tools available for viral and host miRNA research. Moreover, we introduce a brief overview focusing on the role of miRNAs during HBV infection. In this way, this review aims to help the selection of the most appropriate bioinformatics tools based on requirements and research goals.
    Keywords microRNA ; bioinformatics tools ; biomarkers ; hepatitis B virus ; infectious diseases ; chronic infection ; Biology (General) ; QH301-705.5 ; Chemistry ; QD1-999
    Subject code 570
    Language English
    Publishing date 2023-12-01T00:00:00Z
    Publisher MDPI AG
    Document type Article ; Online
    Database BASE - Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (life sciences selection)

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  10. Article ; Online: A Comparison of Network-Based Methods for Drug Repurposing along with an Application to Human Complex Diseases

    Giulia Fiscon / Federica Conte / Lorenzo Farina / Paola Paci

    International Journal of Molecular Sciences, Vol 23, Iss 3703, p

    2022  Volume 3703

    Abstract: Drug repurposing strategy, proposing a therapeutic switching of already approved drugs with known medical indications to new therapeutic purposes, has been considered as an efficient approach to unveil novel drug candidates with new pharmacological ... ...

    Abstract Drug repurposing strategy, proposing a therapeutic switching of already approved drugs with known medical indications to new therapeutic purposes, has been considered as an efficient approach to unveil novel drug candidates with new pharmacological activities, significantly reducing the cost and shortening the time of de novo drug discovery. Meaningful computational approaches for drug repurposing exploit the principles of the emerging field of Network Medicine, according to which human diseases can be interpreted as local perturbations of the human interactome network, where the molecular determinants of each disease (disease genes) are not randomly scattered, but co-localized in highly interconnected subnetworks (disease modules), whose perturbation is linked to the pathophenotype manifestation. By interpreting drug effects as local perturbations of the interactome, for a drug to be on-target effective against a specific disease or to cause off-target adverse effects, its targets should be in the nearby of disease-associated genes. Here, we used the network-based proximity measure to compute the distance between the drug module and the disease module in the human interactome by exploiting five different metrics (minimum, maximum, mean, median, mode), with the aim to compare different frameworks for highlighting putative repurposable drugs to treat complex human diseases, including malignant breast and prostate neoplasms, schizophrenia, and liver cirrhosis. Whilst the standard metric (that is the minimum) for the network-based proximity remained a valid tool for efficiently screening off-label drugs, we observed that the other implemented metrics specifically predicted further interesting drug candidates worthy of investigation for yielding a potentially significant clinical benefit.
    Keywords network medicine ; drug repurposing ; network theory ; Biology (General) ; QH301-705.5 ; Chemistry ; QD1-999
    Subject code 006
    Language English
    Publishing date 2022-03-01T00:00:00Z
    Publisher MDPI AG
    Document type Article ; Online
    Database BASE - Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (life sciences selection)

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