The PeCan platform presents curated pediatric cancer genomics data including variants, mutational signatures, and gene expression data in addition to histological slide images* from ~9000 hematological, CNS, and non-CNS solid tumor patient samples.

Data can be explored via a series of data facets containing both retrospective and prospective study cohorts from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and other trusted institutions and research centers around the world such as TARGET, DKFZ, and many others. Learn more about the data here. *Note that a number of histological slide images are currently embargoed until publication of the associated study.

Home page

The PeCan home page showcases key components for each of the 4 data facets —Variants, Mutational Signatures, Expression, and Histology—, and the tool: PIE (Pediatric Cancer Pathogenicity variant Information Exchange).

To get started (Figure 1), click our navigational membrane which navigates the user to our sunburst and data facets or search a gene or variant.

Figure 1: Home Page. A user can become familiar by reading the key components that is offered in the PeCan Knowledge Base. Additionally, a user can navigate by using our navigational membrane or begin searching a gene or variant of interest.

Sunburst

The sunburst plot gives an at-a-glance disease distribution and disease hierarchy where all samples have been mapped to a custom ontology (Figure 2). This interactive interface updates as a user selects a diagnoses or subtype within in the sunburst.

The diseases are categorized in three main root categories: 1) HM -Hematopoietic Malignancies, 2) BT -Brain Tumor, and 3) ST -Solid Tumor. A user is encouraged to navigate via a subtype-centric experience by selecting a subtype and then navigate to each data facet for that available data. This will enable custom interface views per data facet based on the sunburst selection. Alternatively, a user can explore all of the available data within a data facet by clicking directly on the data facet icon instead of filtering by subtype on the sunburst.

Figure 2: Sunburst Interfacet. A user is able to filter by diagnoses and/or subtype by selecting the interactive sunburst or by navigating directly into a data facet for the available data.

Data Facets explained

Data Facets represent a distinct type of post-processed genomic data for collections of pediatric cancer samples via a designated interface.

Tools