Multi-omics in cardiovascular and respiratory medicine

IHI and wider UCL staff guest editors of the Multi-omics in cardiovascular and respiratory medicine special issue

Would you have a manuscript or abstract to submit?

Contact Ghazaleh Fatemifar or Victoria Garfield.

About this Research Topic

It is almost twenty years since the first genome-wide association study (GWAS) on myocardial infarction. In the intervening years, interest in the genomics of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases has increased beyond expectation, with over 10k combined published associations. GWA studies have also paved the way for more high-throughput technology, advances in ‘omics’ data, and complementary approaches, such as Mendelian randomisation (MR), polygenic risk scores (PRSs) and rare variant analysis. Specifically, MR exploits GWAS results to assess the causality of previously established observational associations and is now also used as a tool in drug target validation.

In synchrony with these significant developments, the prevalence of both cardiovascular and respiratory diseases has been steadily increasing. These diseases remain two of the leading causes of death worldwide.

With the explosion of big data and new ‘multi-omics’ approaches, this is a particularly exciting time in cardiovascular and respiratory research. These novel applications will drive important innovations in drug discovery and personalised medicine.

This article collection aims to provide new answers to old questions in the aetiology of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, with an overarching theme of multi-omics approaches. As such, we welcome contributions that span, but are not limited to reviews, commentaries, and original research.