Senior Research Scientist
Dr. Plaisier’s research is focused on constructing gene regulatory networks from patient data that can be used to discover diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers as well as novel drug targets. To accomplish this he integrates genetic, transcriptional, functional and clinical data together into one comprehensive gene regulatory network. He then designs and conducts experiments which validate the predictions from these gene regulatory networks using in vitro cell culture models. Recently he described a cancer miRNA regulatory network (http://cmrn.systemsbiology.net) which required the development of a novel tool the miRvestigator (http://mirvestigator.systemsbiology.net) and provided a comprehensive picture of miRNA mediated regulation for 46 cancer sub-types. He is currently working to extend the gene regulatory network construction to provide transcription factor mediated regulation for glioblastoma multiforme by integrating genetic, mRNA and miRNA expression, as well as clinical data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA).