CircIMPACT

CircIMPACT analyzes integrative circRNA and gene expression data to identify circRNAs that influence gene expression and molecular pathways.

Key Features:

• Integrative Analysis: Integrates circRNA expression data with gene expression profiles to examine potential regulatory interactions.
• Pathway Detection: Detects molecular pathways associated with specific circRNAs to reveal affected biological processes.
• Visualization Capabilities: Visualizes relationships between circRNAs and gene expression changes to aid interpretation of results.
• Regulatory Axis Identification: Highlights candidate regulatory axes governed by circRNAs for experimental prioritization.

Scientific Applications:

• Investigation of regulatory mechanisms: Identifies circRNAs whose expression changes suggest regulation via microRNAs (miRNAs) and RNA-binding proteins.
• Disease and cancer research: Identifies circRNAs aberrantly expressed in disease contexts, exemplified by analysis of bladder cancer RNA-seq data.
• Pathway and signaling analysis: Links circRNA expression to altered signaling pathways and downstream gene expression changes.

Methodology:

Implemented as an R package that analyzes RNA-seq data by integrating circRNA and gene expression profiles, detecting circRNAs whose expression correlates with changes in gene expression; applied to bladder cancer RNA-seq to identify a circHIPK3–heparanase (HPSE) association and the circHIPK3‑miR558‑HPSE regulatory axis.