ACM TechNews

A 'Next-Gen' Tool to View Genomic Data

Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (08/04/08)

Researchers at the Broad Institute have developed the Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV), a novel and freely available visualization tool intended to help users simultaneously integrate and analyze different types of genomic data, and give them the flexibility to focus on specific genomic regions of interest or zoom out for a wider, whole genome view. The Broad Institute's Jill Mesirov says the new tool creates a Google Maps-like view of integrative genomic data, and combines different types of genomic data into a single, holistic view. IGV will allow researchers to choose a Google Maps-like "street view" of the As, Cs, Ts, and Gs that create a genome, while simultaneously visualizing additional layers of complex information about gene expression and sequence alterations in the genetic code. Other genomic details can also be viewed in IGV, and more importantly all data types can be overlaid or superimposed to determine how changes at one level will affect another. Users can select a variety of options, viewing data as a heat map, histogram, scatter plot, or another format of their choice. The new visualization tool is free and publicly available to researchers on the Internet. Broad Institute director of cancer informatics development Michael Reich says the IGV was designed from the ground up to handle all types of genomic data, and to provide a strong platform for future growth and refinement.

http://www.broad.mit.edu/cgi-bin/news/display_news.cgi?id=5053

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