MINT A MOLECULAR INTERACTION DATABASE

One of the goals of molecular medicine is the rational design of strategies to interfere with the altered protein interaction network of the pathological cell This goal is made difficult by the complex and interconnected functional network of protein interactions that govern cell physiology. Eventually one would like to be able to predict how the perturbation of the activity levels of any combination of genes (for instance by a drug treatment) or of the environment in which a cell lives will affect the phenotype of the cell itself. This task is complicated by the recognition that the relation between genotype and phenotype is mediated by an intricate network of physical and functional interactions between the approximately 30.000 proteins that are encoded in the genome of a complex organism. An essential intermediate step toward this objective is the determination of the complete protein interaction web in which all the tiles of the cell puzzle are correctly put into place. In this context we have established a user friendly protein interaction database which aims at containing all the protein interactions described in the literature and at making this information available to the scientific community. We have originally conceived the establishment of this database as a concerted effort of our group and the students of the PhD program in Molecular and Cellular Biology in Tor Vergata. We are now trying to convince a large number of groups in the Italian scientific community to be directly involved in this effort as curators and reviewers of the functional area of their interest. The success of this strategy will provide a unique tool for scientists working in biology and molecular medicine and for those devoted to the development of more effective and safer therapies.