Meta-analysis of several gene lists for distinct types of cancer: A simple way to reveal common prognostic markers

Background: Although prognostic biomarkers specific for particular cancers have been discovered, microarray analysis of gene expression profiles, supported by integrative analysis algorithms, helps to identify common factors in molecular oncology. Similarities of Ordered Gene Lists (SOGL) is a recently proposed approach to meta-analysis suitable for identifying features shared by two data sets. Here we extend the idea of SOGL to the detection of significant prognostic marker genes from microarrays of multiple data sets. Three data sets for leukemia and the other six for different solid tumors are used to demonstrate our method, using established statistical techniques. Results: We describe a set of significantly similar ordered gene lists, representing outcome comparisons for distinct types of cancer. This kind of similarity could improve the diagnostic accuracies of individual studies when SOGL is incorporated into the support vector machine algorithm. In particular, we investigate t...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2007
• Where: BMCBI
• Authors: Xinan Yang, Xiao Sun
• Keywords: BMCBI 2007, Gene Expression, Gene Expression Profiles, Gene Lists