Moving Towards Predictive Toxicology -A Systems Biology Approach
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Moving Towards Predictive Toxicology -A Systems Biology Approach by Philipp Antczak A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Sc,PhD) College of Life and Environmental Sciences School of Biosciences The University of Birmingham September 2011 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. Abstract Human health and the environment are at risk of being exposed to a large number of hazardous chemicals each day. Unfortunately, many of these chemicals have no or little recorded toxicity information. Predictive toxicology aims to provide tools and methodologies to address this is- sue. In combination with systems biology approaches these can provide a powerful toolbox for understanding the impact of chemicals on biological species. The work presented within this thesis demonstrates the effectiveness of such approaches in the context of industrial and environmentally relevant species. More specifically we focus on char- acterization of a general toxicity mechanism in Rattus norvegius and Daphnia magna as well as for the first time demonstrate that the transcriptional response of D. magna is predictive not only of chemical class but also of measured toxicity. We also show that inclusion of pathway- level information can increase biological interpretability in non-model species. Lastly, we pro- vide evidence supporting the application of reverse engineering methodologies in the context of identifying adverse outcome pathways in Pimephales promelas, an environmentally relevant species. Ultimately, our results have shown that these approaches can provide highly relevant informa- tion in model and non-model species. Further development building on these results could potentially lead to improvements in risk assessment and environmental monitoring. I Acknowledgements First of all, I would like to dedicate this thesis to my loving wife, Kirsten Antczak, and my beautiful daughter, Lena Antczak. Their support during the PhD write-up stage has been indis- pensible providing me with smiles, love, care and support. With all of my heart I would to thank my parents, Wojciech and Wioleta Antczak, for always supporting, loving and pushing me where it was needed to achieve to the best of my abilities. Their care, understanding and sacrifice to provide me with the best outlook on the future will guide me for the rest of my life. I would also like to thank my brother Lukas Antczak, who has supported me and has always been there whenever I needed him. To the rest of my family, especially my grandparents, who have taught me many things during my life. My uncle and aunt, Krzysiek and Agnieszka Sutkowski for their support and help. My remaining uncles, aunts, cousins, and extended family members who have given me so much joy. Professionally I would like to thank my supervisor and mentor, Dr. Francesco Falciani, for his invaluable contribution to this thesis, his guidance, patience and expertise that has given me the confidence in this field. To the head of school, Prof. Kevin Chipman, for providing his expertise towards parts of my work and to Prof. Mark Viant and Prof. Chris Vulpe for their collaborative input during my PhD. Finally I would like to thank my friends and collegues for their professional and intellectual input in this work. Nil Turan-Jurdzinski for being a friend and colleague to discuss matters of personal and professional interest. Anna Stincone for introducing me and the rest of the group to ”but why?” and discussions of various natures. To Wazeer Varsally for the many interesting II shared inventions and captions. I would also like to thank the rest of the group, Kim Clarke, Rita Gupta, Jaanika Kronberg, Helani Munasinghe and Peter Li. III Contents 1 Introduction and Background 3 1.1 Introduction to Predictive Toxicology . 3 1.2 Biological Systems of Relevance . 5 1.2.1 Studies in Rattus Norvegicus ....................... 5 1.2.2 Daphnia Magna ............................. 6 1.2.3 Other Commonly Used Species . 7 1.2.4 Alternatives to Animal Testing . 8 1.3 Data Acquisition . 9 1.3.1 Transcriptome Expression Profiling . 9 1.3.2 Proteomics and Metabolomics . 12 1.3.3 Next Generation Sequencing . 14 1.3.4 Computing Physico-Chemical Features (PCFs) . 15 1.4 'Omics' Data Analysis . 17 1.4.1 Raw Data Pre-processing and Normalization . 17 1.4.2 Identification of Differentially Expressed Genes . 18 1.4.3 Exploratory Data Analysis . 20 1.4.4 Machine Learning Methods for Supervised Classification . 21 1.4.5 Functional Analysis . 22 1.4.6 Network Inference . 23 1.4.7 Building Networks: Reverse Engineering and Network Inference . 23 1.4.8 Identification of Adverse Outcome Pathways (AOPs) using Reverse En- gineering . 25 1.5 Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationship Analysis (QSAR) . 25 1.5.1 Molecular Descriptors . 28 1.5.2 Filtering of Molecular Descriptors . 30 1.5.3 Linking Biological Activity to Chemical Structure . 31 1.6 State of the Art Predictive Toxicology . 34 1.7 Concluding Remarks . 35 2 Mapping Drug Physico-Chemical Features to Pathway Activity reveals Molecular Networks linked to Toxicity Outcome 37 2.1 Abstract . 37 2.2 Introduction . 38 2.3 Results . 39 2.3.1 Rational of the Approach and Data Analysis Overview . 39 2.3.2 Computing Indices of Molecular Pathway Activity. 40 IV 2.3.3 Molecular Pathway Activity in Response to Chemical Exposure is Cor- related to Toxicity. 44 2.3.4 Chemical Features are Predictive of Molecular Pathway Activity. 48 2.3.5 Pathways Whose Activity is Correlated to Chemical Features are Part of a Signalling System Closely Connected with Cellular Communication and Related Functions. 51 2.3.6 PCFs Correlated to Molecular Pathway Activity are Best Predictors of Chemical Induced Toxicity. 55 2.4 Discussion . 59 2.5 Materials and Methods . 78 2.5.1 The Dataset. 78 2.5.2 Summarizing the Transcriptional State of Kidney using Indices of Path- way Transcriptional Activity. 78 2.5.3 Comparing Indices of Pathway Activity in Response to Chemical Ex- posure. 79 2.5.4 Deriving Chemical Physical Features (PCFs). 80 2.5.5 Linking Chemical Features to Pathway Activity Components. 80 2.5.6 Creating and Visualizing a KEGG Pathway Map. 81 2.5.7 Predicting Renal Tubular Degeneration from Chemical Descriptors. 81 3 A Functional Module Based Approach to Chemical Class Prediction in Daphnia magna 83 3.1 Abstract . 83 3.2 Introduction . 84 3.3 Results . 85 3.3.1 Analysis Overview . 85 3.3.2 Gene-level Molecular Signatures can Discriminate Distinct Chemical Classes . 87 3.3.3 A Pathway-level Approach to Predicting Chemical Exposure . 89 3.3.4 Estimating Chemical-Specific Classification Accuracy . 92 3.3.5 IPA Analysis Identifies a Super-Network Representing Plausible Ad- verse Outcome Pathways and Integrating Energy Metabolism, beta- estradiol with TGF-β and IFN-γ signalling . 96 3.4 Discussion . 100 3.4.1 Metabolic Imbalance Characterized Response of D. magna to Metal Exposure . 100 3.4.2 Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals may Act through Pyruvate Metabolism and Extracellular Matrix Receptor Interaction Pathways . 101 3.4.3 Future Directions . 102 3.5 Materials and Methods . 102 3.5.1 Exposures and LC50 measurements . 102 3.5.2 Expression Profiling . 103 3.5.3 Computing Indices of Pathway Activity . 103 3.5.4 Statistical Modelling Procedure . 104 3.5.5 Computing Chemical-Specific Classification Accuracy . 104 3.5.6 Ingenuity Pathway Analysis . 105 V 4 A Pathway-based Approach to Predictive Toxicology in the Crustacean Daphnia magna 106 4.1 Abstract . 106 4.2 Introduction . 107 4.3 Results . 108 4.3.1 Rational of the Approach and Data Analysis Overview . 108 4.3.2 The Transcriptional Profile of Daphnia magna Exposed to Sub-lethal Chemicals Concentrations is Predictive of Toxicity . 109 4.3.3 Computing and Validating Indices of Molecular Pathway Activity . 112 4.3.4 The Transcriptional Activity of Some Pathways is Predictive of Toxicity Outcome . 112 4.3.5 Pathway-based Models are Predictive of Toxicity Outcome . 112 4.3.6 Linking Compound PCFs to Pathway Activity . 116 4.3.7 A Network Linking PCFs, Transcriptional Response to Exposure and Toxicity Outcome . 116 4.3.8 Increased Expression of Genes Within the Amino Acid Metabolism and Signalling Pathways is a Landmark of Toxicity Response . 121 4.4 Discussion . 121 4.4.1 Amino Acid Transporters Provide the Link Between Signalling Path- ways and Amino Acid Metabolism . 124 4.4.2 Amino Acid Metabolism and Whole Organism Toxicity . 124 4.4.3 Blocking of Amino Acid Transporters may Reduce Toxic Effects . 125 4.4.4 Electro-Potential Features Associate to Identified Pathways . 125 4.5 Conclusion . 126 4.6 Material and Methods . 126 4.6.1 The Experimental System . 126 4.6.2 Annotation of Daphnia magna Microarrays . 126 4.6.3 Summarizing the Transcriptional State of Adult D. magna by using In- dices of Pathway Transcriptional Activity . 129 4.6.4 Predicting Toxicity (LC50) by Gene Expression Profiling . 130 4.6.5 Deriving Chemical Physical Features (PCFs). 130 4.6.6 Linking Chemical Features to Pathway Activity Components. 131 4.6.7 Developing a KEGG Pathway Map . 139 5 Application of Reverse Engineering in Ecotoxicology 145 5.1 Abstract . 145 5.2 Introduction . 146 5.3 Results . 147 5.3.1 A Compendium of Gene Expression Profiling Experiments Represent- ing in vivo and in vitro Response of the Fathead Minnow Ovary to En- docrine Disruptors .