Title iCartiGD : The Integrated Cartilage Gene Database

Background: Diseases of cartilage, such as arthritis and degenerative disc disease, affect the majority of the general population, particularly with ageing. Discovery and understanding of the genes and pathways involved in cartilage biology will greatly assist research on the development, degeneration and disorders of cartilage. Description: We have established the Integrated Cartilage Gene Database (iCartiGD) of genes that are known, based on results from high throughput experiments, to be expressed in cartilage. Information about these genes is extracted automatically from public databases and presented as a single page report via a web-browser. A variety of flexible search options are provided and the chromosomal distribution of cartilage associated genes can be presented. Conclusion: iCartiGD provides a comprehensive source of information on genes known to be expressed in cartilage. It will remain current due to its automatic update capability and provide researchers with an easily accessible resource for studies involving cartilage. Genetic studies of the development and disorders of cartilage will benefit from this database. Background Diseases of cartilage, such as arthritis and degenerative disc disease, affect the majority of the general population, particularly with ageing. In recognition of the impact of musculo-skeletal disorders on society, 2000–2010 has been declared the bone and joint decade by the World Health Organization [1]. One aim of this decade is to foster research relevant to musculo-skeletal systems. Discovery and understanding of the genes and pathways involved in cartilage biology will greatly assist research on the development, degeneration and disorders of cartilage. To this end we have established the Integrated Cartilage Gene Database (iCartiGD) of genes that are known, based on results from high throughput experiments, to be Published: 23 February 2007 BMC Genetics 2007, 8:4 doi:10.1186/1471-2156-8-4 Received: 20 September 2006 Accepted: 23 February 2007 This article is available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2156/8/4 © 2007 Yeung et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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