DNA microarray for stem cell research

Our group has been interested in two types of stem cells: resting stem cell(SC) in the adult body such as melanocyte SC and hematopoietic cell, and constitutively self-renewing embryonic stem cells such as ES cells or mesenchymal stem cells. As an approach to investigate molecular mechanisms supporting stem cell systems, we have spent some years to establish a DNA microarray data-base of stem cells and subpopulations derived from various stem cells. The most important issue of this project is how to collect cell populations for analysis. Through efforts over years, we succeeded to purify more than 100 populations and subjected to DNA microarray analysis, that have developed to a continuously expanding database of transcription based on Affymetrix oligonucleotide arrays. In order to handle the data generated in this process we have developed novel analysis systems that allow both analysis and dissemination of the data. Importantly this system allows the data to be accessed concurrently by a number of researchers specializing in various aspects of stem cell research, thus allowing the biologically relevant information to be extracted. In this workshop, I will describe an ability of our data-base and analysis software by addressing a couple of issues of stem cell research such as stemness genes and fate determination. Secondly, we will describe some genes that were discovered by using our data-base. Indeed, these examples strongly suggest a potential of this data-base as a platform of functional genomics.