BMC Semniar - Serum protein networks in humans link genetics to disease

BMC Seminar Thursday 20th of December at 12:00 in room 343 Læknagarður

Speaker: Valur Emilsson, PhD, Head of Systems Genetics at the Iceland Heart Association.

Title: Serum protein networks in humans link genetics to disease

Abstract: Despite being featured prominently in industry and academia, the promise of personalized medicine has largely not been realized. Here I would like to highlight our recent work that suggests that systemic homeostasis in humans is mediated to a significant degree by cross tissue regulatory loops involving serum proteins, and where the proteins were also associated with past, current and future disease states. It is therefore possible to capture the detailed disease status of individuals in a unified, global and largely non-invasive manner by measuring protein levels in serum samples. The levels of approximately 4800 protein analytes in the sera of 5500 individuals was measured and the relationships of those proteins to each other and to extensive disease measures and genetic variation in the same individuals assessed. This work indicates that serum proteins are assembled into networks as intermediaries between genetic variation and with the appearance of disease across the population.