MULTIOMICS - SCI & TECH
News: ‘Multi-omics’ is changing how
India spots and treats TB, cancers
What's in the news?
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Multi-Omics is an emerging technology in the field
of clinical science in India.
Multi-Omics:
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Multi-omics (multiple omics) is a new approach in
biological sciences where the data sets
of different omic groups are combined to power discovery across multiple levels
of biology.
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By combining data researchers can achieve a more comprehensive understanding of
molecular changes contributing to normal development, cellular response,
and disease.
Omic Groups:
Genomics:
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It focuses on the structure, function, evolution,
mapping, and editing of information coded within an organism’s DNA.
Transcriptomics:
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Study the complete set of RNA transcripts produced by the genome.
Proteomics:
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Evaluate protein
expression for a better understanding of cellular function and prediction
of therapeutic responses.
Epigenomics:
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Examine heritable changes in gene expression activity caused by factors other than DNA changes.
Metabolomics:
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Metabolome comprises all the metabolites present in a cell, tissue, or organism, including small
molecules, carbohydrates, peptides, lipids, nucleosides, and catabolic
products.
Microbiomics:
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It consists of all the microorganisms of a community.
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Microbes have been found in human skin, mucosal
surfaces, and gut.
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The microbiome is analyzed by sequencing the 16S
rRNA genes or metagenomics quantification.
Omics Datasets:
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They are libraries characterizing a specific
biological feature, such as the genes, lipids, proteins, metabolites, or
microbes of an organelle, cell, tissue, or organism.
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Individual analysis of an omics dataset can
identify links between the characterized feature and a specific-biological
phenomena.
Multi Omics Strategy:
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Multiomics is the integrated analysis of multiple
omics datasets through which one can identify mechanisms of action, biomarkers,
networks, pathways, and other relationships present in physiological and
pathological processes.
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The field encompasses all the omics fields and aims
to understand the native and altered state of an organism by the analysis of
the data from different omics experiments.
Purpose:
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Multi Omics approach is critical to find strategies to characterize, monitor,
predict and find treatment to many diseases.
India’s approach to
Multi Omics:
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India is creating disease-specific datasets with
many diseases specific consortia emerging around the country creating datasets
to address individual health problems, ranging from tuberculosis to cancers, rare genetic disorders in children, and even
antimicrobial resistance.
Indian Gene Map:
1. Genome India Project:
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The project is a national initiative which aims to
develop a reference genome for Indian
people, which will help design genome-wide and disease-specific ‘genetic
chips’ for low-cost diagnostics and research.
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The Department of Biotechnology had completed
sequencing 10,000 genomes from 99 ethnic
groups.
2. Mission IndiGen:
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The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) had sequenced the entire genomes of 1,008 individuals in
India representing diverse ethnic groups.
Aim:
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To create a pilot dataset with which researchers
could analyse the epidemiology of genetic diseases and help develop affordable
screening approaches, optimise treatment, and minimise adverse events for them.
India’s Disease Specific
Initiatives:
1. Tuberculosis:
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The Indian
Tuberculosis Genomic Surveillance Consortium (InTGS) comprises 10 sites
covering eight states and aims to sequence around 32,000 tuberculosis clinical
strains from active patients, and develop a centralised biological repository
of clinical Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains in India.
Goal:
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It is to validate
identified mutations to develop a sequence based method to determine drug
resistance, and to combine the epidemiological data with results from
whole-genome sequencing to develop working solutions.
2. Mission for Rare
Genetic Disorders:
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India has also launched a pan-country Mission for
Paediatric Rare Genetic Disorders (PRaGeD) which plans to create awareness,
perform genetic diagnosis, discover and characterise new genes or variants,
provide counselling, and develop new therapies for rare genetic diseases.
Data Source:
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The mission will incorporate IndiGen data in its in-house bioinformatic pipelines
and will be used to analyse the parts of a genome that code for proteins
(exome).
3. Cancers:
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The Indian
Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC-India) is a part of the larger International
Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) and is supported by the Department of
Biotechnology, plans to characterise genomic abnormalities in different types
of cancers in Indian patients and identify population-specific genetic
variations that are linked to cancer risk and treatment response.
Indian Cancer Genome
Atlas Project:
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It is a not-for-profit
public-private-philanthropic initiative that will create a comprehensive
catalogue of genomic alterations across various cancer types prevalent in India
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The projects can facilitate the discovery of novel
biomarkers, potential new treatment targets, and personalised treatment
strategies
4. Antimicrobial
Resistance:
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Genome sequencing provide information about the resistance profile of microbes
therefore helping clinicians make judicious use of antibiotics.