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ucl cancer institute
paul o'gorman building
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Medical
Genomics
-Professor Stephan Beck
The laboratory has broad interests in the genomics of phenotypic plasticity in health and disease. In addition to polymorphisms and mutations, we study epigenetic changes such as DNA methylation and histone modifications that can modulate genome function under exogenous influence. Central to our research is the development an integrated systems approach - termed 'reverse phenotyping' - to screen genomes of common diseases as well as cancer for genetic, epigenetic and combinatorial variations. The ability to distinguish causal from consequential variations is one of the key challenges in biomedical research. Once fully established, 'reverse phenotyping' can be expected to significantly increase our ability to identify novel and, in particular, combinatorial variations causing or contributing to phenotypic plasticity and thus will provide new targets for translation into diagnostics and therapeutics. The laboratory offers state-of-the-art facilities and a stimulating environment for graduate and post-doctoral training.
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Group Members
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Christopher
Bell (christopher.bell@ucl.ac.uk)
I gained my undergraduate degree in Medicine from Otago University in New Zealand, and after attaining full registration
worked in the N.H.S. for several years. An initial foray into research at Bart's Genome Centre led to the offer to work
towards a Ph.D. in human complex trait genetics, with Philippe Froguel, Professor of Genomic Medicine at the
Hammersmith Hospital, Imperial College. This involved genomewide linkage, and physiological & positional candidate
gene association studies, in Type II Diabetes and Obesity. Subsequently I took up one of then only two medical
trainee positions in Genetics for the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia, involving rotations through
prenatal & cancer laboratories, reporting, as well as designing and validating new tests. My research interest
is focused widely on Common Disease Genomics, with specific interest in susceptibilities that have arisen through
human evolutionary mechanisms. I am excited to join Prof. Stephan Beck & his team to investigate the Epigenomics
of Common Disease.
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Lee
Butcher (l.butcher@ucl.ac.uk)
I graduated from Sussex University in 2001
with a BSc in Experimental Psychology and an
appetite for the genetic basis of psychological
traits. In 2006 I completed my PhD under the
supervision of Professor Robert Plomin at the
Institute of Psychiatry (King’s College
London) where I co-developed a high-throughput,
genome-wide allelotyping method. Toward the
end of my time at the IoP, a spate of high-powered
genome-wide association studies (GWAS) appeared
that indicated that single SNP effects in common
complex disease were small but ubiquitous. This
led me into ‘epigenetics’, which
– I feel – may contribute more profoundly
to human health and disease than solely sequence-based
approaches. In early 2008 I joined Professor
Beck’s lab to establish a high-throughput
DNA methylation pipeline."
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Pawan
Dhami (pawan.dhami@ucl.ac.uk)
After completing my post graduation studies in India in the field of Human Genetics, I moved to the UK
to pursue a career in research. Subsequently, I completed my PhD in 2006 under the supervision of Dr. Dave
Vetrie based at the Sanger Institute, Cambridge. My PhD thesis involved elucidation of DNA-protein interactions
using ChIP-chip to study the transcriptional regulation of SCL gene during haematopoietic development. I
also used ChIP-chip assay to build maps of DNA-protein interactions at a genome-wide scale in the human and
mouse genomes to identify and elucidate various classes of cis-regulatory functional elements, e.g. promoters,
enhancers, insulators etc. and link these functional elements to biological processes. To continue and broaden
my research in the epigenetics field, I have recently joined Prof. Stephan Beck's lab to understand how DNA
methylation plays a role in vertebrate development.
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Andrew
Feber (a.feber@ucl.ac.uk)
I completed my BSc (Hons) degree at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne. In 2001 I joined
the Institute of Cancer Research, where under the supervision of Prof. Colin Cooper I carried out
my PhD, investigating the genomic alterations associated with the development and progression of
urological cancers. In September 2005 I joined the laboratory of Dr. Tony Godfrey at Mount Sinai
Medical School, New York, to start my postdoctoral training. During my time in New York I worked
on the integration of high resolution genomic copy number, gene expression and miRNA expression
data to define molecular signatures associated with esophageal cancer patient survival and to
identify novel therapeutic targets. In March 2008, I returned to the UK to join the laboratory of
Prof. Stephan Beck, at the UCL Cancer Institute, London, to investigate the role of methylation
in the development and progression of cancer.
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Andrew Teschendorff (a.teschendorff@ucl.ac.uk)
In 1995 I graduated with a BSc in Mathematical Physics from the University of Edinburgh. I then studied for
the Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics (formerly Part III of the Maths Tripos) at the University of
Cambridge. I then stayed on in Cambridge to do a PhD in Theoretical Particle Physics at the Department
of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics and completed the thesis in January 2000. In a desire to
do more "real-world" research I decided to move away from Particle Physics, and joined the Complexity
Research Group of BT Laboratories in Ipswich, where I worked for 1 year on Statistical Modelling of
telecommunication networks. This sparked my interest in Statistical Modelling generally and I thus joined
the Mathematics Institute, University of Warwick, where I worked on Statistical Genetics and Spatial Ecology.
Inspired to work on human disease related genetic data, in October 2003 I joined the Breast Cancer Functional
Genomics Laboratory within the Department of Oncology at the University of Cambridge to work on Statistical
Cancer Genomics. I remained there until September 2008, when I joined the Medical Genomics Group at the UCL
Cancer Institute. My research focuses on the application of statistical pattern recognition and machine
learning techniques to multi-dimensional cancer genomic data (mRNA and miRNA expression, aCGH, epigenetics,
SNPs, metabolomics). The purpose of this research is to help characterise the different cancer subtypes
(my main interest is in breast cancer) in terms of specific patterns of aberrant signalling pathways and
the underlying causal genomic alterations, and thus to identify novel targets for personalised and more
effective therapies.
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Christina Thirlwell (christina.thirlwell@ucl.ac.uk)
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Gareth
Wilson (gareth.wilson@ucl.ac.uk)
I obtained my undergraduate degree in Genetics
from Cardiff University. Following this, I decided
to take the leap into the world of Bioinformatics.
I completed an MSc in Bioinformatics at the University
of Manchester, before completing a PhD at CEH
Oxford and Bath University under the supervision
of Dr Dawn Field and Dr Ed Feil. My research revolved
around the analysis of taxonomically-restricted
genes in bacterial genomes. I am now very happy
to be a member of the Medical Genomics group in
the UCL Cancer Institute where I am responsible
for the design and implementation of the computational
tools needed to support the group. This includes
the analysis of MeDIP experiments using the Batman
(Bayesian Tool for Methylation Analysis) software
and the development of databases and interfaces
to enable storage and visualisation of our large
epigenetic datasets.
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Past
Members
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contact@cancer.ucl.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7679 6500
