Focus on the Future
INSTITUTE OF CARDIOVASCULAR SCIENCE
Junior Faculty Networking event
24th September 2015
WELCOME
The Junior Faculty welcomes you (whether junior or senior) to our first Networking event of ICS.
Who is the Junior Faculty? I’m glad you asked. If you are a postdoc or higher, and are not senior faculty,
then you must be part of the crucial, core, hardest workers of ICS – the JF!
Why? The purpose of the meeting is to discuss our work, to facilitate communication between the
members of ICS at the Junior Faculty level, and to stimulate collaboration, and support future success
with grant applications.
BACKGROUND
Recently, at the suggestion of Prof Aroon Hingorani, the Junior Faculty began regular meetings to
discuss the present and future direction of research at ICS. This is of particular interest now, at a time
when major changes are underway at UCL in terms of the organization of cardiovascular research. This
may be a time of challenges, but we also see it as a time of great opportunities, in terms of
opportunities for collaboration, potential sharing of resources, and extensive combined experience
which can be drawn upon. In essence, we see it as an opportunity to focus on the future.
However, the first small step to achieve is to establish exactly who the groups of ICS and the members
of the JF are! If you are here it’s because you’ve been identified as a likely JF member, but if there are
other postdoctoral fellows or senior fellows in your lab who are interested they are most welcome to
join.
The JF hold regular meetings shortly after each of the Senior Management meeting, where our moles
representatives report back, and we discuss ways of improving ICS, eg: ways to improve interaction and
productivity. The JF meetings are open to all JF members. If you would like to attend, please contact
Mike Higgins to enquire about the time and location (which rotates around the ICS “virtual campus”).
Finally, we hope you find today’s networking event useful, and welcome suggestions for future events.
Sean, Ruth, Rob and Gerry
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PROGRAM FOR THE DAY
2:15
Registration
2:30 – 2:40
Introduction to meeting – Ruth Lovering
2:40 – 3:10
Talk: “Scientific Collaboration: If, Why, How and How Not’” - Aroon Hingorani
3:10 – 3:45
Four short presentations by ICS groups – Chair Sean Davidson
Jess Buxton
“Short telomeres and cardiometabolic disease risk: a causal link?”
Senior Research Associate with Steve Humphries
Centre for Cardiovascular Genetics
Chrysoula Dalageorgou “Inherited Cardiovascular Disease Group ICDG: Overview of Activities & Research”
Research Associate with Perry Elliot
Inherited Cardiovascular Disease Group (Centre for Cardiology in the
Young)
Sean Davidson “Protecting the heart from ischaemia and reperfusion injury”
Senior Research Fellow with Derek Yellon Hatter Cardiovascular Institute
Felix Kruger
“Role of genetic association studies in drug development”
Research Associate with Aroon Hingorani Genetic Epidemiology
3:45 – 4:05
Tea
4:05 – 4:45
Five short presentations by ICS groups – Chair Gerry Byrne
Jigisha Patel “Interaction between prostacyclin and endothelin pathways in Pulmonary arterial hypertension”
Research Associate with Lucie Clapp
Cardiovascular physiology and pharmacology
Gerry Byrne “Xenogeneic antigens and their effects on animal tissues used in clinical biomedical devices and
products”
Principal Research Associate with Chris McGregor Cardiovascular Surgery
Giovanni Biglino “clinical cardiovascular engineering: simulations and 3D models moving toward translation?”
Research Fellow (NIHR) with Andrew Taylor Clinical Cardiovascular Engineering , GOSH
Therese Tillin “Building on the Strengths of UCL’s Cohorts”
Research Fellow, Clinical Epidemiologist with Alun Hughes
Cardiometabolic Phenotyping Group
Riyaz Patel
Senior Clinical Research Fellow with John Deanfield Congenital Heart Disease
4:45 – 4:50
Grab a glass of wine or soft drink
4:50 – 5:30
Focus group discussions – Introduction Rob Bell
5:30 – 6:00
Feedback from discussions - Chair Rob Bell
6:00 – 7:00
Wine and networking
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BIOGRAPHIES/RESEARCH INTERESTS OF SPEAKERS
Robert Bell, Hatter Cardiovascular Institute
Key strengths, technologies, know-how
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Cell and isolated primary cardiomyocyte models of simulated ischaemia/reperfusion injury.
Ex vivo and in vivo small animal models of acute myocardial infarction.
Ex vivo human cardiac tissue models of simulated IRI.
Phase 2 proof-of-concept clinical studies in protecting the myocardium from injurious
ischaemia/reperfusion injury and the kidney from the toxicity of contrast agents.
Research focus on novel mechanisms of cell injury and cytoprotection, cell signalling, ischaemic
and pharmacological conditioning.
Translation of novel drug and therapeutic interventions
Giovanni Biglino, Clinical Cardiovascular Engineering, GOSH
My main research interests are: experimental/hydrodynamic work for cardiovascular simulations, including
acquisitions of MRI (4D flow); wave intensity analysis (invasive as well as MRI-derived); 3D printing,
exploring clinical translation and uses for patients and public involvement (PPI); computational modelling
of congenital heart disease; cardiac assist devices.
Jess Buxton, Centre for Cardiovascular Genetics
My primary scientific interests lie in elucidating the contribution of structural, sequence and epigenetic
variation in the human genome to disease. My current main focus is the role of telomere integrity in
cardiometabolic disease. Shorter leukocyte telomere length (LTL) predicts the onset of several age-related
diseases, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. Recent genome-wide association studies
have revealed associations between LTL and several common genetic variants, which also affect risk of
coronary artery disease. My overall research goal is to identify the mechanisms through which telomere
shortening affects cardiometabolic disease risk, by studying telomere shortening in vitro, combined with
genetic and epigenetic studies in human populations. I am also interested in discovering how non-genetic
factors affect telomere length and 'biological ageing rate', particularly chronic stress.
Gerry Byrne, Cardiovascular Surgery
I have 20 years of experience in genetic engineering and immunology of xenotransplantation. I joined UCL
in 2009 and my main research interest is to leverage technologies we developed for cardiac
xenotransplantation for the production of a new generation of improved bioprosthetic heart valves. I work
with Professor McGregor on a collaborative MRC funded translational program developing improved heart
valves based on genetically modified pig tissue.
Chrysoula Dalageorgou, Inherited Cardiovascular Disease Group (Centre for Cardiology in the Young)
I have been responsible for processing and analyzing samples from patients with cardiomyopathic disease
(Dilated cardiomyopathy, Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular
cardiomyopathy), heart failure and sudden cardiac death, using Ultra-Deep Sequencing technology, with
the aim of implementing DNA diagnosis into clinical practice.
Sean Davidson, Hatter Cardiovascular Institute
I am investigating cardiac injury during ischaemia and reperfusion. The aim is eventually to find new ways
of preserving the heart from injury during a heart attack. Two of my main topics of interest are exosomes
and SDF-1. Exosomes are nano-sized vesicles which can communicate between cells, carrying proteins
and miRNA. We have shown that exosomes in the blood are cardioprotective and are studying the
mechanism, and their role. SDF-1 is a chemo-attractant cytokine - or a "chemokine" - which can attract
stem cells to the heart, and can also directly activate signaling pathways in the heart. We are developing
novel reagents to detect SDF-1, understand its role in the heart, and to deliver it to the heart therapeutically.
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I frequently use imaging techniques such as confocal and multiphoton microscopy to visualize real-time,
physiological changes in cardiac cells and hearts. Using fluorescent dyes it is possible to detect changes
in such important parameters as oxidative stress, Calcium, and mitochondrial activity.
Felix Kruger, Genetic Epidemiology
Felix Kruger is a research associate in computational biology, working in the ICS Genetic Epidemiology
group. Felix is exploring approaches that harness data from genetic association studies for the early stages
of drug development. To achieve this, Felix and others in the group are pursuing a data integration
approach that combines drug annotation data with genetic association data and relevant bioinformatics
resources.
Jigisha Patel, Cardiovascular physiology and pharmacology
Jigisha is studying patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) to establish biomarkers of early
disease (smooth muscle hypertrophy) and the impact of prostacyclin therapy on a broader range of markers
of endothelial dysfunction and inflammation in PAH.
Ruth Lovering, Centre for Cardiovascular Genetics
I have been participating in the annotation of the human genome for over 15 years and now lead an
annotation team based at UCL. This team has submitted over 8% of the manual Gene Ontology annotations
associated with human genes and is now also contributing protein interaction data to the EBI resource
IntAct. We are funded by the British Heart Foundation and Parkinson’s UK and we focus our annotation
effort on proteins and microRNAs relevant to cardiovascular disease and neurological processes.
Therese Tillin, Cardiometabolic Phenotyping Group
My main areas of interest centre on the epidemiology of ethnic differences in cardiovascular and metabolic
disorders and the mechanisms underlying these differences. I am particularly interested in the effects of
diabetes and insulin resistance on cardiovascular disease risk in ethnic minority groups and in identifying
how and why; these disorders appear to have a more harmful effect in people of South Asian or African
Caribbean origin than in comparable Europeans.
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DISCUSSION GROUPS
 What are the big questions for the field?
 What are the opportunities for clinical translation and the potential obstacles?
 How might your expertise contribute?
(Table 6: “How can ICS best leverage its talent and resources to improve health care?”)
The aim of these discussions is to:
Provide a flavour of the science currently being undertaken
Enable opportunities for potential collaborations within ICS
Networking between different groups and individuals working within ICS
1. personalized medicine
Tina Shah, Giovanni Biglino, Nancy Campbell, Andrew Cook, Chris McGregor, Mike Higgins, Sam Curtis
2. ischaemic heart disease
Sean D, Anastasia Kalea, Alexander Jones, Riyaz Patel, Silvia Schievano, Lucie Clapp
3. Hypertension, vascular dysfunction and co-morbidities
Jess Buxton, Emilie Sauvage, Pier Lambiase, Derek Yellon, Jigisha Patel, Paul Denny, Simon Galloway
4. Imaging / cardiovascular devices – what are the translational opportunities
Gerry Byrne, Andrew Taylor, Petros Syrris, Ruth Lovering, Sapna Arjun, Catriona Baker
5. Non-ischaemic cardiomyopathy / HF with preserved EF
Chrysoula Dalageorgou, Rob Bell, Ann Walker, Felix Kruger, Claudio Capelli, Raymond Macallister, Angs Maulik
6. Gene discovery, basic research, clinical translation – what does ICS/UCL need
to do to leverage the talent/resources in the dept?
Aroon Hingorani, Michele Orini, Heerajnarain Bulluck, Jutta Palmen, Emily Williams, Therese Tillin
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LIST OF CONTACTS AND ATTENDEES
Junior Faculty members and other attendees
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Tina Shah
Andrew Taylor
Pier Lambiase
Chrysoula Dalageorgou
Catriona Baker
Alexander Jones
Felix Kruger
Michele Orini
Petros Syrris
Sapna Arjun
Rob Bell
Heerajnarain Bulluck
Sean Davidson
Jess Buxton
Nancy Campbell
Paul Denny
Anastasia Kalea
Ann Walker
Giovanni Biglino
Claudio Capelli
Emilie Sauvage
Silvia Schievano
Chris McGregor
Derek Yellon
Charlotte Hall
Rachael Huntley
Ruth Lovering
Jutta Palmen
Therese Tillin
Lucie Clapp
Gerry Byrne
Riyaz Patel
Jigisha Patel
Andrew Cook
Emily Williams
Angs Maulik
Raymond Macallister
Aroon Hingorani
Mike Higgins
Sam Curtis
Simon Galloway
If you would like to contact one of the event organizers directly, please contact:
Ruth Lovering (r.lovering@ucl.ac.uk)
Sean Davidson (s.davidson@ucl.ac.uk)
Rob Bell (rob.bell@ucl.ac.uk)
Gerry Byrne (guerard.byrne@ucl.ac.uk)
Mike Higgins, ICS Executive Assistant (m.higgins@ucl.ac.uk)
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