Literature Search Tool for Cytoscape 2.1
The automated literature search tool, for the multidisciplinary study of biological systems, is available as a free plug-in to Cytoscape 2.1, an open-source bioinformatics platform that enables researchers to form a visual map of complex biological networks, increasing their understanding of molecular pathways and the biological causes of disease. This tool automatically searches for and extracts information from multiple textual databases, such as those of the U.S. Patent Office and the National Center for Biotechnology Information (PubMed). The plug-in pulls information from these sources and represents it within the platform as a map of the relationships between the biological entities, such as genes and proteins. A microarray or an LC/MS-proteomics experiment can typically result in hundreds of genes and proteins of interest. Researchers enter the names of all genes of interest, along with keywords that describe the types of relationships being searched. The plug-in searches accessible databases and generates a computational representation of gene/protein associations grouped into a network that biologists can see and manipulate within Cytoscape.
