ICTS Precision Health Update |
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Precision Health Innovation Awards
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Dr. Walsh and his lab study the mechanisms of immune cell activation in uveitis (inflammation of the eye). Using the ICTS Innovation award funding they seek to evaluate macular edema, which is the leading cause of vision loss in patients with uveitis. Unfortunately, the molecular reasons for this disease are still poorly understood. Their project aims to quantify the clinical characteristics of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID)-responsers from NSAID-nonresponders and evaluate the molecular underpinnings of those responses to better target therapy and to understand different processes that can lead to macular edema in uveitis. Follow Dr. Walsh’s research to see where this work leads.
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Precision Health Faculty Leadership Achievements |
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Dr. Megan Cooper and colleagues were awarded a 5-year $12.4M P01 grant from the NIH to investigate genetic mechanisms of rare disorders of the immune system that lead to immune deficiency and dysregulation. This project, led by Cooper and WashU and including 3 institutions seeks to address the 70% of patients with these diseases who remain undiagnosed. Cooper and her colleagues will investigate alternative genetic mechanisms of disease including somatic mutations and test samples from 2000 currently undiagnosed patients.
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Dr. Joyce (Joy) Balls-Berry was recently awarded the 2025 Dean's Impact Award! Check out the neurology department announcement here. In January Joyce was also recognized as a 40 for 40 MLK servant leader. This award recognizes 40 exceptional individuals in the St. Louis community who exemplify Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s principles of servant leadership, and align with the Gateway Region YMCA's mission to strengthen communities through youth development, healthy living, and social responsibility.
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Dr. Laura Bierut was recently awarded the Academic Women's Network (AWN) Mentorship award. The AWN was established in 1990 by women faculty at WUSM to promote professional interactions and career development and to assist and mentor women in science and medicine. The AWN Mentor Award is intended to recognize an individual who has served as an outstanding mentor to women at Washington University School of Medicine. Dr. Bierut received this award at the Spring Dinner and 35th Annual Gala on April 4th, 2025.
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Dr. Malachi Griffith and colleagues were awarded a 5-year R01 grant from the NIH to addresses technological challenges in personalized neoantigen immunotherapy for cancer treatment, focusing on developing a more precise and broadly applicable neoantigen prediction algorithm by integrating multiomic data. This approach aims to improve the prediction and clinical utility of neoantigen- based therapies and to provide community resources through open data and open-source software, promoting wider application and innovation in the field.
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Dr. Chris Gurnett has been promoting her science in the community. Her recent study highlights barriers to genetic testing for Black children and uses these results to improve testing access. This work was highlighted by the Source at WashU, find the article here. Additionally, this work was featured in a St. Louis Public Radio interview. The research team also included another ICTS Precision Health team member Dr. Joyce Balls-Berry.
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In our last newsletter the Precision Health function assessed data needs in the ICTS community related to managing computational workflows executed on local infrastructure (e.g., High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters) as well as third-party cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, Google Cloud, Azure). Thank you to the 79 participants who provided feedback. We were able to reach over 15 different departments across WashU. These results have been presented to the WashU IT Governance Subcommittee.
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| Precision Health Services |
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We support up to $25,000 pilot awards for developmental or early stage work in precision health. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
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| Our service aims to provide researchers with the connections and tools to make return of genetic results a reality for their study participants.
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| Sharing genomic data is a requirement of many NIH funded grants. Reach out if you need support in data organization, submission & sharing.
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Help build our community by sharing this newsletter with colleagues. They can register here for our mailing list.
Connect with others doing Precision Health research and bioinformatics by joining and exploring our Slack workspace. Join here.
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| WashU Institute of Clinical and Translational Sciences
660 South Euclid Avenue, MSC 8066-22-03
St. Louis, MO 63110-1093
* Cite the NIH CTSA Grant Number UL1TR002345 when your research was supported by ICTS/CTSA funds or services
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One Brookings Drive | St. Louis, MO 63105 US
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