Topological methods for genomics: Present and future directions

Topological methods are emerging as a new set of tools for the analysis of large genomic datasets. They are mathematically grounded methods that extract information from the geometric structure of data. In the last few years, applications to evolutionary biology, cancer genomics, and the analysis of complex diseases have uncovered significant biological results, highlighting their utility for fulfilling some of the current analytic needs of genomics. In this review, the state of the art in the application of topological methods to genomics is summarized, and some of the present limitations and possible future developments are reviewed.