An RNASeq normal tissue atlas for mouse and rat

The function of a gene is closely connected to its expression specificity across tissues and cell types. RNA-Seq is a powerful quantitative tool to explore genome wide expression. The aim of the present study is to provide a comprehensive RNA-Seq dataset across the same 13 tissues for mouse and rat, two of the most relevant species for biomedical research. The dataset provides the transcriptome across tissues from three male C57BL6 mice and three male Han Wistar rats. We also describe our bioinformatics pipeline to process and technically validate the data. Principal component analysis shows that tissue samples from both species cluster similarly. By comparative genomics we show that many genes with high sequence identity with respect to their human orthologues have also a highly correlated tissue distribution profile and are in agreement with manually curated literature data for human. These results make us confident that the present study provides a unique resource for comparative genomics and will facilitate the analysis of tissue specificity and cross-species conservation in higher organisms.基因的功能与其在各组织及细胞类型中的表达特异性紧密关联。RNA测序（RNA-Seq）是一种可用于全基因组表达分析的高性能定量工具。本研究旨在为生物医学研究中两类核心模式生物——小鼠与大鼠，提供一套覆盖完全相同13种组织的完整RNA测序数据集。该数据集包含3只雄性C57BL/6小鼠与3只雄性Han Wistar大鼠的各组织转录组数据。本研究同时详述了用于数据处理与技术验证的生物信息学分析流程。主成分分析（Principal Component Analysis）结果显示，两个物种的组织样本呈现出高度相似的聚类模式。通过比较基因组学分析，本研究发现诸多与人类直系同源基因序列一致性较高的基因，其组织分布模式同样具有高度相关性，且与经人工整理的人类相关文献数据相符。上述结果表明，本研究为比较基因组学领域提供了独特的研究资源，将有效助力高等生物的组织特异性及跨物种保守性相关分析。