A team from The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and College of Medicine has created a new database in an effort to help researchers study Alzheimer’s disease.
A study on the database, called ssREAD, was published in “Nature Communications” in June. It is freely searchable and contains 1,053 samples with 67 Alzheimer’s disease related studies, totaling 7.3 million cells. The researchers also archived data from 18 human and mouse brain studies.
“Each dataset is annotated with details such as species, gender, brain region, disease/control status, age and AD Braak stages,” the report’s authors wrote.
This isn’t the first time the team has launched a database. In 2020 they launched scREAD, which at the time was the first database that managed single-cell RNA-sequencing and single-nucleus RNA-sequencing data from both human and mouse tissue.
The researchers noted that despite improvements in technology, the data gathered was not well managed by Alzheimer’s disease databases.
The database is noted to have “marked improvements” to its interface, allowing for more interactive visualizations.
“These modifications, grounded in user-centric design principles, advance visibility and usability, fostering an environment conducive to intuitive data visualization and streamlined querying,” the study states.
Each ssREAD dataset contains details including species, gender, brain region, disease/control distinction and AD Braak stages, according to the report.
“We are closing the gap for researchers by creating this specialized database. Integrating these diverse datasets and conditions will be invaluable for researchers studying the complex landscape of Alzheimer’s disease,” Qin Ma, Ph.D., professor in Ohio State’s department of biomedical informatics, told publication Medical Xpress.
