Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Life Sciences Conference 2014
Population health in a Post-Genomic
Era
Abstracts
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Oral presentations
Monday 15 December
Title:
Health marketing communications: An integrated conceptual framework of key determinants of
health behaviour across the stages of change
Author(s):
Danae Manika and Diana Gregory Smith
Summary
Despite the development of many health behaviour theories across various topics, the
inconsistency in empirical support for their propositions and the ongoing criticism about their limitations
highlight the need for an adjusted and integrated approach. These theories have never been ‘abandoned’ or
altered significantly to address their limitations, since their conceptualisations.
The aim of this paper is to make a conceptual contribution by integrating distinct health behaviour theories
(i.e. Health Belief Model, Extended Parallel Process Model, Transtheoretical Model), with a popular
information-processing and attitude change theory from the marketing communications arena (namely, the
Elaboration Likelihood Model).
Title:
Prenatal nutrition and childhood respiratory and atopic outcomes: using genetic epidemiology to
strengthen causal inference
Author(s):
Prof Seif Shaheen
Summary
Evidence from birth cohort studies has implicated prenatal nutrition in the aetiology of childhood respiratory
and atopic outcomes. The problem with observational studies, and a particular issue in nutritional
epidemiology, is that it is difficult to exclude confounding of key findings (given the strong social patterning
of diet and correlations between nutrients) using conventional methods of statistical analysis.
Before embarking on expensive nutritional intervention studies in pregnancy which may fail because they
are based on confounded epidemiological data, what more could be done to obtain more robust findings in
observational studies? This talk will illustrate the potential value of exploring gene-nutrient interactions and
using a Mendelian randomisation approach to strengthen causal inference, in order to inform the design of
trials which will have a greater chance of success.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Title:
Using zebrafish models for development of personalised therapies- a proof of principle
study using smoking as an example
Author(s):
Alistair J.Brock, Matthew.O.Parker, David Joliffe, Valerie Kuan, Teck. M. The, Adrian
Martineau, Robert Walton, Caroline H. Brennan
Summary
Smoking is one of the leading preventable causes of adult mortality today and places a huge social and
financial burden on society. One step toward the effective prevention and treatment for nicotine addiction
would be to delineate genetic variants that mediate individual differences in sensitivity to the drug and
responses to treatment.
Although animal models cannot replicate all the complexities of human smoking, they can help with the
identification of genetic factors influencing component behaviours such as reward sensitivity, amount
smoked, persistent drug taking, and relapse. Recently we, and others, have established behavioural assays
of drug seeking and impulse control in adult zebrafish and used these to demonstrate conservation of
reward pathways including responses to nicotine in fish as in mammals. These studies raise the possibility
of using mutagenesis screens in fish to identify genes affecting complex behaviours such as nicotine
preference, which is one aspect of smoking, in humans.
Title:
Predicting outcomes from language in mental health therapy
Author(s):
Matthew Purver, Rose McCabe, Christine Howes
Summary
Aspects of doctor-patient communication in therapy can predict patient symptoms, satisfaction and future
adherence to treatment. Computational natural language processing provides methods to automatically
derive linguistic features; we examine their application to predicting therapy outcomes.
Title:
Temporal genomic profiling reveals diverse patterns of clonal evolution in haematological
malignancy
Author(s):
Jun Wang, Jessica Okosun, Kiran Tawana, Shamzah Araf, Claude Chelala and Jude Fitzgibbon
Summary
Cancer initiation and progression can be seen as an evolutionary process influenced by a myriad of intrinsic
and extrinsic factors. An understanding of the dynamics of tumour clonal evolution may provide insight into
effective ways to stratify or personalise therapies.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Title:
Congenital cavernous malformation: A family business
Author(s):
Dr Maerouf Malik, Dr Venkat Karrupswamy and Dr Sajeev Job
Summary
A five year old girl presented with recurrent falls for six weeks. This was followed by a sudden onset of
weakness of the left side with shooting pain lasting 1-4 minutes. She showed an asymmetrical gait with
increased tone and hyper-reflexia on the left side of the body. She also showed a minor vascular marking at
the back of her neck. On examination we found same lesions in a sibling and the mother.
The objective is to find the genetic cause of this condition in the family, to examine other siblings and the
parents for the same clinical condition and prevent morbidity and mortality.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Tuesday 16 December 2014
Title:
The emotional side of autoimmune disease: a new venue for treatment?
Author(s):
Prof F. D’Acquisto
Title:
Human neutrophil microvesicles modulate macrophage phenotype: innovative approaches to
immunotherapy
Author(s):
Hefin Jones, Sarah Headland, Lucy Norling, Mauro Perretti
Summary
Extracellular vesicles (including microparticles [0.1-1 μm diameter]) are emerging as a novel mode of
intercellular communication endowed with great therapeutic potential for nanomedicine. Released in
response to cellular activation, microparticles are a major vector mechanism for the delivery of protein,
nucleic acid and bioactive lipid payloads in local tissues and plasma1,2. Their composition and
downstream efficacy depend upon their maternal cell, cellular stimulus and target cell type. Human
neutrophil microparticles promote tissue protection, and in some cases repair, by affecting function and
phenotype of other inflammatory cells 3,4. Of these, tissue macrophages are central to the recovery of
homeostasis after an inflammatory insult. Elucidating the mechanism by which neutrophil microparticles
may (re)condition macrophages is necessary to harness them effectively as innovative therapeutic tools
for chronic inflammatory conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis. The objective of the presentation is to
investigate the effects of neutrophil-derived microparticles on human monocyte-derived macrophage
phenotype and to establish the mechanistic involvement of exposed microparticle phosphatidylserine.
Title:
Pseudoexon activation in nicotinamide nucleotidetranshydrogenase as a novel mechanism
for disease in two siblings with Familial Glucocorticoid Deficiency
Author(s):
Tatiana Novoselova, Li Chan, Lou Metherell
Summary
Intronic DNA frequently encodes potential exonic sequences called pseudoexons. In recent years
mutations resulting in aberrant pseudoexon inclusion have been increasingly recognised to cause
disease. The objective is to find the genetic cause of Familial Glucocorticoid Deficiency (FGD) in two
siblings.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Title:
RNA sequencing of adrenals from mice with knockout or overexpression of nicotinamide
nucleotide transhydrogenase reveals novel pathways perturbed by redox imbalance
Author(s):
Eirini Meimaridou, Lou Metherell
Summary
In humans nicotinamide nucleotide transhydrogenase (NNT) dysfunction leads to an adrenal specific
disorder, glucocorticoid deficiency. NNT, a ubiquitous protein of the inner mitochondrial membrane,
produces high concentrations of NADPH for detoxification of reactive oxygen species by glutathione and
thioredoxin pathways. Certain sub-strains of C57BL/6J mice contain a spontaneous Nnt mutation and
display glucocorticoid deficiency with glucose intolerance and reduced insulin secretion. A BAC
transgenic rescue of this mouse strain results in overexpression of Nnt (1.9 fold over WT)
Title:
Co-assembly, spatio-temporal control, and morphogenesis of a hybrid peptide/protein system
Author(s):
Inostroza, Karla E., Collin, Estelle., Siton, Orit., Smith, Katherine H., Monge, Amàlia., Alonso, Matilde.,
Rodriguez-Cabello, José C., Ferrera, Daniela., Pérez Rodriguez, Raúl., Reis, Rui L, Sagués, Francesc.,
Botto, Lorenzo., Bitton, Ronit., Azevedo, Helena S., Mata, Alvaro.
Summary
The objective of this project is to fabricate a dynamic protein/peptide self-assembling system with
hierarchical order and spatio-temporal control as a platform to create either personalised therapies for
disease treatment (through molecularly designed materials) or biomimetic in vitro models for cell studies
that can help understand how the environment changes the genome, how to influence it, and how to
design more precise therapies.
Title:
Evidence synthesis for patient-specific decision support using Bayesian networks
Author(s):
Anthony Constantinou, Barbaros Yet, Norman Fenton, William Marsh
Summary
For patient-‐specific decision support it will often be necessary to combine information from genomic and
post‐genomic datasets with other relevant physiological and social factors. This is challenging and
requires the synthesis of evidence from published statistics and patient records. The objective is to
demonstrate both the need for evidence synthesis for patient-specific decision support and ways to
achieve this.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Poster presentations
15 – 16 December
Title:
Discovery of novel peptide regulators of collagenous tissue
Author(s):
Liisa M. Blowes, Himadri S. Gupta, Maurice R. Elphick
Summary
The aim of this study is to investigate how a peptide derived from collagen can modify MCT
Title:
Overcoming challenges in muscular dystrophy research: Genome editing tools for targeted gene
correction in patient-specific iPSC
Author(s):
Beatrice Lana and Young-Yao Lin
Summary
Our research focuses on the study of allelic mutations in the putative glycosyltransferase FKRP gene,
which cause a wide range of muscular dystrophy. In order to address this problem, we aim to develop an
isogenic pair of control and patient-specific iPSC and use it as a model to study FKRP-deficient muscular
dystrophy.
Title:
Vitamin D receptor genotype modifies the effect of vitamin D supplementation on risk of upper
respiratory infection in COPD patients
Author(s):
David A Jolliffe, Wai Yee James, Richard Hooper, Charles A Mein, Robert Walton, Christopher J Griffiths,
Adrian R Martineau
Summary
We have previously shown that vitamin D receptor (VDR) genotype modifies response to vitamin D
supplementation in tuberculosis patients. Studies investigating the effects of genetic variation in the vitamin
D pathway on response to vitamin D supplementation for protection against upper respiratory infection
(URI) are lacking.
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Life Sciences Conference 2014:
Population Health in a Post--Genomic Era
15 - 16 December 2014
Title:
Immunological control of the sense smell: lesson from the RAG-1-/- immunodeficent mice
Author(s):
Lorenza Rattazzi, Ridhika Poojara, Anna Cariboni, Fulvio D’Acquisto
Summary
The main objective of this study was to model in an experimental system the link between immunity and
olfaction and to investigate the possible mechanisms behind this crosstalk
Title:
Massage-like stroking boosts the immune system in mice
Author(s):
Benjamin Major, Lorenza Rattazzi, Fulvio D’Acquisto
Summary
In this study, we tested the effects of stroking on the immune system of mice to better understand the
immunomodulatory effects of massage-like therapy
Title:
Identification of the genetic alterations in prostate metastases
Author(s):
Elzbieta Stankiewicz, Xueying Mao, Tracy Chaplin, Daniel M. Berney, Yong-Jie Lu
Title:
Differential diagnosis of adrenal insufficiency by Whole Exome
Author(s):
Tatiana Novosoleva, Lou Metherell
Other posters displayed at the conference include:
 QMUL Life Sciences – domains, research and vision for Life Sciences at QMUL
 Public Engagement at QMUL – information on public engagement projects at QMUL that link
to Life Sciences
 Students and Life Sciences
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