CT 2.1.3 Viral Networks, connecting virus-human interaction networks to population disease patterns

Introduction To discover the underlying principles that translate genomic information to observed phenotypes (e.g., diseases) the study of global properties of cellular networks is essential. Any perturbation to the network, originated by a virus or drug, impacts not just the locally targeted subnetwork but spreads through out the network. This global cascading damage spreading in cellular networks is largely not understood. We have developed a method that provides a new approach to study virus-human interactions and its correlations with diseases. Our method is not specific to the virus reported here, and it involves the utilization of protein-protein interaction data obtained from various experimental methods with gene-disease correlations and patient medical history data.