CICERO gene sequencing tool (SJ-20-0017)

St. Jude Reference #SJ-20-0017

Description

Researchers at St. Jude have developed CICERO, software designed to detect gene fusion events from RNA-seq data that are difficult to detect with conventional techniques. It is currently being used to determine the status of kinase fusions for leukemia and lymphoma patients. CICERO could be widely used to provide the precision medicine for pediatric and adult cancer patients.   

Differing from other fusion detection tools, CICERO focuses on detecting complex and diverse driver fusions. CICERO has enhanced sensitivity for detecting cancer driver fusions. Users can easily find pathogenic fusions in CICERO output using an incorporated heuristic ranking strategy. Furthermore, an interactive viewer is provided which helps users (1) curate fusions, (2) identify known, novel, recurrent fusions, (3) integrated gene expression data, (4) compare with St. Jude gene mutation database.

Keywords

CICERO, gene fusion event software, RNA-seq data, human tumor tissue, kinase fusion, leukemia, lymphoma, precision medicine, detecting cancer driver fusions, pathogenic fusions, ranking, interactive viewer

Granted patents or published applications

No patent filings are planned, but CICERO is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights that apply to software.

Related scientific references

A manuscript is under journal review.

Licensing opportunities

The tool has been freely accessible for academic users since Dec. 2019 at: https://github.com/stjude/Cicero. Anyone interested in commercial use should contact the Office of Technology Licensing.  

Contact the Office of Technology Licensing (Phone: 901-595-2342, Fax: 901-595-3148) for more information.