After completion of the Human Genome Project, various post-genomics
approaches are being undertaken to utilize the genome information
such as for drug target discovery and personalized medicine.
In Fall 2003 the U.S. National Institutes of Health announced
the Roadmap, which contained new chemical genomics initiatives
for screening of useful chemical compounds including imaging
probes and drug leads. Our COE program was initiated before
the NIH Roadmap, but we had foreseen the importance of small
chemical compounds. Our program consists of three research
components:
pharmacogenomics for drug target discovery,
chemogenomics for drug lead discovery, and
environmental genomics for understanding the relationship between genomic and environmental information,
especially, drug targets and drug leads, in terms of the
molecular interaction networks. Searching for a lead compound
and its target is just one example of searching for a perturbant,
its target, and any consequence of the perturbed biological
system. Therefore, our approaches currently focused on pharmaceutical
science can be generalized and applied to wider areas of
biological sciences. We are developing bioinformatics technologies
to integrate genomic and chemical information, and to decipher
molecular wiring diagrams involving both endogenous and exogenous
molecules. This will enable basic understanding of the biological
systems and their interactions with the chemical environments,
as well as new medical and industrial applications.