Comparative Analysis of DNA Microarray Data through the Use of Feature Selection Techniques

One of today’s most important scientific research topics is discovering the genetic links between cancers. This paper contains the results of a comparison of three different cancers (breast, colon, and lung) based on the results of feature selection techniques on a data set created from DNA micro array data consisting of samples from all three cancers. The data was run through a set of eighteen feature rankers which ordered the genes by importance with respect to a targeted cancer. This process was repeated three times, each time with a different target cancer. The rankings were then compared, keeping each feature ranker static while varying the cancers being compared. The cancers were evaluated both in pairs and all together, for matching genes. The results of the comparison show a large correlation between the two known hereditary cancers, breast and colon, and little correlation between lung cancer and the other cancers. This is the first study to apply eighteen different feature rankers in a bioinformatics case study, eleven of which were recently proposed and implemented by our research team.