EPIXplorer: A web server for prediction, analysis and visualization of enhancer-promoter interactions

Nucleic Acids Res. 2022 Jul 5;50(W1):W290-W297. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkac397.

Abstract

Long distance enhancers can physically interact with promoters to regulate gene expression through formation of enhancer-promoter (E-P) interactions. Identification of E-P interactions is also important for profound understanding of normal developmental and disease-associated risk variants. Although the state-of-art predictive computation methods facilitate the identification of E-P interactions to a certain extent, currently there is no efficient method that can meet various requirements of usage. Here we developed EPIXplorer, a user-friendly web server for efficient prediction, analysis and visualization of E-P interactions. EPIXplorer integrates 9 robust predictive algorithms, supports multiple types of 3D contact data and multi-omics data as input. The output from EPIXplorer is scored, fully annotated by regulatory elements and risk single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). In addition, the Visualization and Downstream module provide further functional analysis, all the output files and high-quality images are available for download. Together, EPIXplorer provides a user-friendly interface to predict the E-P interactions in an acceptable time, as well as understand how the genome-wide association study (GWAS) variants influence disease pathology by altering DNA looping between enhancers and the target gene promoters. EPIXplorer is available at https://www.csuligroup.com/EPIXplorer.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms
  • Computers
  • Disease Susceptibility
  • Enhancer Elements, Genetic
  • Genome-Wide Association Study*
  • Humans
  • Internet
  • Promoter Regions, Genetic
  • Regulatory Sequences, Nucleic Acid*
  • Software*