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June 30, 2025

Discover the Variant Navigator - Your Ultimate Tool for Exploring Protein Variants

Navigating protein variants just got easier with the latest feature in the Cancer Knowledgebase (CKB) BOOST platform - the Variant Navigator! This powerful tool helps researchers and clinicians visualize and analyze variants within specific exons or protein regions giving you deeper insights into their impacts and effects.

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What is the Variant Navigator?

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The Variant Navigator displays protein-coding and positional category variants as lollipop graphs along the protein sequence. The Y-axis shows the number of variants at each position, making it easy to spot variant hotspots.

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Access the Variant Navigator in CKB BOOST by clicking the 'Explore Variant Naviator' button.

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What can you do with Variant Navigator?

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Toggle between:

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  • Variant Impact - See the biological significance of variants, for eg: missense or nonsense mutations.

  • Protein Effect -  Understand how variants affect protein function, for eg: gain of function or predicted effects.

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Explore Interactive features:

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  • Customizable tracks - Explore tracks showing protein domains regions, subcellular location, and exons, for a more focused view.

  • Dynamic visualizations - Some of the lollipops include mini pie chart visualizations showing the distribution of various types of variants at that site.

  • Hover for quick details - Hover over any lollipop to see a detailed table with all curated variants in that position.

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Filter and focus your search:

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  • Want to only see certain types of variants? Use the legend to select/deselect variant impacts or protein effects of interest.

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Access detailed variant table in the same window

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You can access detailed insights on all visible variants including impact, protein effect, and much more. Dynamic updates based on selection provides a seamless experience between visual and tabular data. The Variant Navigator is more than just a visualization - it is your go-to tool for understanding protein variants with clarity and precision. Whether you are identifying hotspots or exploring protein domains, this feature puts powerful insights at your fingertips.

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Interested in learning more about the CKB solution? Click here to meet with a team member

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AUTHOR
Cara Statz, PhD
Manager, Oncology Curation