| Literature DB >> 17154715 |
Alon Kaufman1, Gideon Dror, Isaac Meilijson, Eytan Ruppin.
Abstract
The claim that genetic properties of neurons significantly influence their synaptic network structure is a common notion in neuroscience. The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans provides an exciting opportunity to approach this question in a large-scale quantitative manner. Its synaptic connectivity network has been identified, and, combined with cellular studies, we currently have characteristic connectivity and gene expression signatures for most of its neurons. By using two complementary analysis assays we show that the expression signature of a neuron carries significant information about its synaptic connectivity signature, and identify a list of putative genes predicting neural connectivity. The current study rigorously quantifies the relation between gene expression and synaptic connectivity signatures in the C. elegans nervous system and identifies subsets of neurons where this relation is highly marked. The results presented and the genes identified provide a promising starting point for further, more detailed computational and experimental investigations.Entities:
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Year: 2006 PMID: 17154715 PMCID: PMC1676027 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.0020167
Source DB: PubMed Journal: PLoS Comput Biol ISSN: 1553-734X Impact factor: 4.475
Figure 1Prediction of Synaptic Connectivity Signatures as a Function of the Most Informative Genes
The accuracy of the predictor as a function of the number of genes selected for the predictor is described by the blue line. Prediction accuracy is measured by AUC. The top panel shows the outgoing connectivity results, and the lower panel shows the incoming connectivity results. The rightmost point (289 genes) denotes the prediction outcome before any feature selection is applied to the data. The blue line represents 5-fold cross-validation repetitions of the selection–prediction scheme (mean and standard deviations are displayed). The red dashed lines represent the empirical null hypothesis distribution of performing the selection–prediction scheme on random data (constructed by shuffling the identities of the neurons, see Materials and Methods). Maximum AUC measurements are achieved with 53 and 30 features in the incoming and outgoing assays, respectively, with corresponding p-values of p = 10−99 and p = 10−97, calculated by applying a one-sided t-test between the original and shuffled data (see Materials and Methods).
Figure 2Covariation Correlation Feature Selection Assay
The mean and standard deviation of the Pearson correlation (blue line) between the neurons' neighborhood relations in the expression and connectivity spaces is displayed as a function of the number of genes used to determine the expression signature (results of ten repetitions of the assay each with 90% of the neurons). The top panel shows the outgoing connectivity results, and the lower panel shows the incoming connectivity results. The rightmost point (289 genes) denotes the correlation before any feature selection is applied to the data. The dashed red line represents the empirical null hypothesis distribution of the covariation correlation on random data (constructed by shuffling 1,000 times the identities of the neurons and reapplying the analysis to the shuffled data). Maximum correlation measurements are achieved with 39 and 92 features in the incoming and outgoing assays, respectively, with corresponding p-values of p < 0.0001, p = 0.004, respectively (see Materials and Methods).
List of Genes Involved in the Analysis Which Have Previously Been Reported in the Literature as Acting in Axonogenesis and Synaptogenesis