Background:
The project investigates biomarkers (chemicals in people’s blood, urine, saliva and sputum) that may be detectable before patients develop symptoms or changes are seen on hospital scans and chest X-rays. The project then further explores how biomarkers are affected by changes in a person’s condition or treatment. Information from participants’ medical records are gathered together with samples that undergo i-omics analysis. This research programme, which is contributing to educational studies, may help to diagnose these types of diseases earlier so that future care can be improved.
Outcomes:
This is an ongoing project in collaboration with Aberystwyth University. The project began with Hywel Dda University Health Board in 2016 and was extended to include Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board in 2017. More than 1200 participants with a respiratory condition have been recruited to date.
A number of publications and conference abstracts have already resulted from this work, including:
Publications:
- da Costa, R.; Love, K.; Beckmann, M.; Morley, A.; Bhatnagar, R.; Maskel, N.; Mur, L.A.; Lewis, K. Metabolomics differentiate cancer from non-cancer pleural effusions based on steroid lipids and acyl carnitines. medRxiv 2020, 10.1101/2020.07.27.20162958, 2020.2007.2027.20162958, doi:10.1101/2020.07.27.20162958.
- Paes de Araujo, R.; Bertoni, N.; Seneda, A.L.; Felix, T.F.; Carvalho, M.; Lewis, K.E.; Hasimoto, E.N.; Beckmann, M.; Drigo, S.A.; Reis, P.P., et al. Defining Metabolic Rewiring in Lung Squamous Cell Carcinoma. Metabolites 2019, 9, doi:10.3390/metabo9030047.
- Mironas, A.; Cameron, S.; O’Shea, K.; Lu, C.; Lewis, P.; Mur, L.; Lewis, K. Exploiting metabolomic approaches to aid in the diagnosis of lung cancer. European Respiratory Society: 2016. (Conference)
- Non-targeted integrative multi-omics approaches on sputum reveal potential diagnostic and monitoring biomarkers for respiratory diseases (2017) Luis Mur, Adrian Mironas, Rachel Paes de Araujo, Keiron O’Shea, Keir Lewis
Conference abstracts:
- Early exploratory use of omic approaches to assess metabolite changes in COPD (2020) Tina Kramaric, Sarah Thomas, Katie Love, Ian Bond, David Rooke, Luis Mur, Keir Lewis
- Rapid diagnostic approaches for thoracic disease based on pleural effusions (2018) Katie Love, Rachel Paes de Araujo, Ricardo da Costa, Manfred Beckmann, Keir Lewis, Nick Maskell, Luis Mur