GraphOmics: an Interactive Platform to Explore and Integrate Multi-Omics Data

AO_SCPLOWBSTRACTC_SCPLOWO_ST_ABSBackgroundC_ST_ABSAn increasing number of studies now produce multiple omics measurements that require using sophisticated computational methods for analysis. While each omics data can be examined separately, jointly integrating multiple omics data allows for a deeper understanding and insights to be gained from the study. In particular data integration can be performed horizontally, where biological entities from multiple omics measurements are mapped to common reactions and pathways. However, data integration remains a challenge due to the complexity of the data and the difficulty in interpreting analysis results. ResultsHere we present GraphOmics, a user-friendly platform to explore, integrate multiple omics datasets and support hypothesis generations. Users can upload transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics data to GraphOmics. Relevant entities are connected based on their biochemical relationships, and mapped to reactions and pathways from Reactome. From the Data Browser in GraphOmics, mapped entities and pathways can be ranked, sorted and filtered according to their statistical significance (p-values) and fold changes. Context-sensitive panels provide information on the currently selected entities, while interactive heatmaps and clustering functionalities are also available. As a case study, we demonstrated how GraphOmics was used to interactively explore multi-omics data and support hypothesis generations using two complex datasets from existing Zebrafish regeneration and Covid-19 human studies. ConclusionsGraphOmics is fully open-sourced and freely accessible from https://graphomics.glasgowcompbio.org/. It can be used to integrate multiple omics data horizontally by mapping entities across omics to reactions and pathways. Our demonstration showed that using interactive explorations from GraphOmics, interesting insights and biological hypotheses could be rapidly revealed.