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No. 21: GeneLab’s Liver Paper Published, Processed Data Studies, GeneLab at ASGSR, New Visualization and Analysis Platform

NASA GeneLab: Open Science for Life in Space

 

Newsletter No. 21: December 2019

 

Greetings from GeneLab!

New GeneLab Paper Shows Disruption of Lipid Metabolism in Mouse Liver

Spaceflight has several detrimental effects on the physiology of astronauts, many of which are recapitulated in rodent models. Mouse studies performed on the Space Shuttle showed dysregulation of lipid metabolism in liver. This dysregulation can potentially lead to increased chance of liver disease in astronauts due to the space environment. Read more...

figure from liver paper
Common molecular pathways in livers from mice flown to space from multiple spaceflight missions. 


 

New Studies Added to GeneLab Repository

GeneLab recently added three new studies to the GeneLab Data Repository.

Interested in Differential Gene Expression results? GeneLab has added processed data to 11 GLDS studies. Click here for the full list: GeneLab Processed Studies.


 

GeneLab’s Strong Presence at ASGSR

GeneLab’s participation at the 35th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Gravitation and Space Research (ASGSR), held November 20-23, 2019 in Denver, CO, received much attention. GeneLab began the week with a pre-conference Analysis Working Group (AWG) Workshop on November 19. Read summary below.

The 2nd Annual Analysis Working Group Workshop and Showcase

GeneLab hosted two meetings on Nov. 19, a day before ASGSR’s annual conference officially began. The morning began with a closed session for AWG members to provide current group statuses, discussion on current processing pipelines for various assays, and 12 roundtable topics where members spend 15 minutes at each table providing input and recommendations.

round table discussions
As part of the AWG workshop, 12 round table discussions were held.

GeneLab’s afternoon session, the AWG Showcase, was open to all conference attendees. The showcase featured talks by members from each of the four AWG groups (plants, multi-omics, microbes, animals) demonstrating the various projects, tools, and papers in development. The showcase ended with a special presentation from invited speaker Stefania Giacomello, on Spatially resolved transcriptome profiling in human and spaceflight mouse hearts.

AWG members provided progress on the work and papers from each of the four groups: plants, multi-omics/systems biology, microbes,and animals.

Willian da Silveira
Willian da Silveira updated the audience on the progress of the Multi-omics AWG.


 

Eliah Overbey Wins Publication Award

Eliah Overbey, a young scientist in the GeneLab Analysis Working Group, won the 6th Annual ISS-National Lab Student Investigator Award for her publication, 
Mice exposed to combined chronic low-dose irradiation and modeled microgravity develop long-term neurological sequelae.

Eliah Overbey
Eliah Overbey received the ISS-National Lab Student Investigator Award. She is pictured here (center) with Space Biology PI Vivien Mao (left) and Space Biology Deputy Program Scientist Kevin Sato.


 

Talks, Posters and Demonstration

In addition to the AWG preconference meetings, the GeneLab team gave nine science talks and two investigator and undergraduate/graduate poster presentations throughout the week. GeneLab also demonstrated new components of the GeneLab Data Systems, the visualization portal and updated analysis platform. Attended by more than 60 members, Afshin Beheshti presented how users can query differential gene expression data, compare data through pair and volcano plots, and visualize the genes affecting pathways through the S-plot. For users looking to analyze data, Amanda Saravia-Butler demonstrated the functions, tools, and workflow for processing RNA-Seq data through the GeneLab analysis platform.

Amanda Saravia-Butler demonstrated the functions, tools, and workflow for processing RNA-Seq data through the GeneLab Analysis platform.


 

GeneLab’s Latest Software Release Delivers New Visualization Platform

On November 15, 2019, GeneLab delivered its latest software release of the only spaceflight-relevant omics database in the world, adding to its already large, annotated database, the ability to analyze omics data and visualize already processed data. GeneLab is forging the way to life science space data democratization, making the interpretation of complex omics easier and thus facilitating the GeneLab community to generate new hypotheses more quickly and accurately. Read more...

data viz example
Example of an interactive Principle Component Analysis (PCA) plot of GeneLab dataset GLDS-25.


 

Upcoming Meeting

GeneLab will be represented at NASA’s Space Life Sciences exhibit booth at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting, February 13-17, in Seattle, WA. Stop by and let’s talk processed omics data on GeneLab’s visualization platform.


 

Happy Holidays! See you in the New Year!

The GeneLab Team