The Intellectual Property & Science business of Thomson Reuters has announced a partnership with the nonprofit Children's Tumor Foundation (CTF). The aim is to further the understanding of neurofibromatosis (NF) research by creating schemas that visually demonstrate the main pathways involved in NF and how the organisation allocates funds for research and development.
CTF is dedicated to finding effective treatments for neurofibromatosis, a term for three distinct genetic disorders - NF1, NF2 and schwannomatosis. NF causes tumours to grow on nerves throughout the body and affects one in every 3,000 people. There is currently no known cure and there are relatively few treatment options.
CTF selected Thomson Reuters to construct disease funding maps for each of the different types of NF. The project was led by the Thomson Reuters Life SciencesProfessional Services team, which started with MetaCore, an integrated software suite for systems biology that includes the manually curated, database of biological pathways.
Extracting the key biological processes from the disease pathways and then merging them with funding data through the MetaCore Pathway Map Creatorsoftware resulted in new pathway maps. These maps give a snapshot of the different biological processes in each of the NF disease types and the list of grants funded by the Foundation. Integrated with the maps are dashboards that show how key areas of the research and development process – such as disease model development, biomarker population studies and development stage, and drug development status — are also funded. These interactive visualisations provide a detailed view that demonstrates how funds are being invested. The disease maps are currently available on the CTF website and the biological content will be updated annually by Thomson Reuters as part of the ongoing collaboration.
