The cells in our body, communicate with each other. This is done by means of signalling. Each cell sends out signals for either communication within the cell (autocrine) or with other cells (paracrine).

How are these cells released and received? The signals secreted by the cells are called ligands, which are small molecules which find its way to other cells. All cells express receptors which are protein molecules. The ligand attaches itself to the receptors and change the structure of the receptor.

The function of the ligand can vary. It can be activators, inhibitors, signalling receptor, and neurotransmitters.

CellPhoneDB is a repository of ligand-receptor interacting pairs. Through this repo, a computaional approach to identify biologically relevant ligand-receptor interaction can be done.

This tool provides

  1. expression analysis
  2. statistical inference between specific interactions
  3. Retrieval of Differentially Expressed Interactions in CellPhoneDB

More on installations to come . .