Ontological visualization of protein-protein interactions

GO annotation at Mouse Genome Informatics (MGI) captures 1318 curated, documented interactions. These include 129 binary interactions and 125 interaction involving three or more gene products. Three networks involve over 30 partners, the largest involving 109 proteins. Several tools are available at MGI to visualize and analyze these data.Curators at the MGI database annotate protein-protein interaction data from experimental reports from the literature. Integration of these data with the other types of data curated at MGI places protein binding data into the larger context of mouse biology and facilitates the generation of new biological hypotheses based on physical interactions among gene products.Cellular processes require the interaction of many proteins across several cellular compartments. Interactions can range in stability from persistent, such as between members of a stable complex, to transient, such as binding while being phosphorylated. Determining the collective network of such interactions should provide insight into which processes the individual members participate, and how they may be regulated.Understanding protein interaction networks requires two steps. First, the interacting proteins must be identified, usually through some experimental methods. Secondly, the significance of the interaction networks needs to be assessed. Recently, there has been a focus on devising large scale screening methods to collect data on interacting proteins [1-3]. Additionally, several strategies have been used to predict networks based on small peptide interaction [4], analysis of co-evolution of protein families [5], analysis of orthology [6], and co-inheritance [7]. However, many of these types of studies are hindered by their inability to place the significance of the interaction networks in the broader biological context.In addition to the large screening efforts, a significant amount of specific protein-protein interaction data has been reported in the literature