The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) is an initiative sponsored by the National Cancer Insitute at the National Institutes of Health to map the genomic changes in over 20 types of cancer.

This five-year program began in 2009 and has already made strides in comprehensive sequencing and characterization of brain and ovarian cancers, for example. A guideline for selection of what to study is the cancer’s poor prognosis and overall public health impact. The TCGA web site keeps up-to-date on recent advances as well as new cancers added to the study. Visitors can track the progression of the program as well as receive information specific to a desired cancer by visiting the Cancers Selected for Study tab of the web site.

For researchers and clinicians, TCGA offers raw datasets of information about the genomic make-up and change of specific cancers. By clicking on the blue Launch Data Portal button on any screen of the web site, you can find your cancer type on the list, and download the data in one of two ways as a visitor: in matrix format or as a bulk download. The differences between the two ways are depicted on the Download Data page. Another feature the Data Portal provides is the ability to Query the Data. This allows you to search the data for genes, patients and pathways.