Centralization of genomics-bioinformatics will provide the SPORE investigators with access to the state-of- the-art genomic capability and bioinformatics expertise, by leveraging existing institutional infrastructure such as Harvard/Partners Center for Genomics and Genetics and the Belfer Cancer Genomics Center. An important benefit derived from centralization comes from improved data storage and sharing, allowing for better integration of ideas and information across the various projects within the SPORE. Moreover, given the pace of discovery in areas of genomics and bioinformatics, it is difficult to predict where the field will stand even one year in advance. This invariant feature of change provides justification for a core with strong technical implementation capability and intellectual leadership throughout the granting period, so that the best technology will be brought to bear on the biological questions of the SPORE. This Core will provide several levels of support to the SPORE. First, it will offer bioinformatics consultation, in collaboration with Biostatistics, to assist all projects in the design and preliminary analyses of genomic studies, including copy number and expression profiling as well as gene re-sequencing. In this process, the Core will serve the central coordinating role in data receipt/storage for genomic assays in all projects, so that integrated analyses can be performed more easily. Second, the Core will leverage existing institutional infrastructure for established capabilities such as expression profiling and candidate gene re-sequencing. In addition, the Core will bring to the SPORE unique capability in high-resolution copy number profiling by array-CGH. Third, the Core will provide custom-designed tools and bioinformatics expertise for mining copy number data with integrated expression analyses.
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