ABSTRACT
Biomedical research has traditionally taken a reductionist approach, where the layers of a specific biological process are removed until a single gene, protein, or mutation is identified as the biochemical basis of the observed effect. High-density screening methods and large-scale sequencing projects have taken this to the next level, where multiple single genes or proteins are analyzed, and approaches to assemble these data into coherent patterns of multiple single elements can point to regulatory networks that control a given process. These approaches have generated a wealth of information that now needs to be analyzed using integrated approaches where the biological context is retained and the gene, protein, or mutation is analyzed in the living body. High-content cell-based assays are one step toward systems integration; however, interrogation of intact living subjects at the level of cells and molecules is the ultimate level of systems biology and integration. The emergence of the nascent field of in vivo cellular and molecular imaging marks the beginning of an era of integrated biomedical research.
