With its twelfth release of data, the Human Protein Atlas project has now shared protein data for more than 80% of the human protein-coding genes and RNA expression data for more than 90% of the genes.
This latest release reportedly covers 16,621 genes and includes protein expression profiles based on 21,984 antibodies.
In addition to the data release, a major restructuring of the knowledge portal was undertaken with the release of four separate subatlases: the Normal Tissue Atlas, Subcellular Atlas, Cell-line Atlas, and Cancer Atlas.
The Normal Tissue Atlas is the largest of the four sub-atlases and contains more than 13 million images of protein profiling in 46 human tissues of different origin. The Atlas now also includes RNA transcript data for 27 of these organ-specific tissues using next-generation sequencing, providing a tissue distribution map of both protein and gene expression.
“We are truly excited about the RNA transcript data and the map of gene expression that we now have for 27 different organ-specific tissues,” says professor Mathias Uhlén, program director of the Human Protein Atlas. “This data allows classification of all human protein-coding genes into those coding for household functions (present in all cells) and those that are tissue-specific genes with highly specialized expression in particular organs and tissues, such as kidney, liver, brain, heart, and pancreas. These are interesting starting points for all researchers interested in human biology and disease.”
The work has been carried out at the Science for Life Laboratory (SciLifeLab) in Stockholm and Uppsala and is funded by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation.