Search
Functional studies of how early-life interventions shape the airway microbiome remain scarce. Here, we performed metagenomic sequencing of 704 longitudinal nasal swabs from infants with and without cystic fibrosis (CF) to construct and characterize a non-redundant gene atlas of the infant nasal microbiome. We aimed to determine how the nasal microbiome is perturbed by early therapies, as CF is commonly treated with inhaled hypertonic saline to improve mucociliary clearance.
Head, Epigenetics
The Australian Genomics Cardiovascular Disorders Flagship was a national multidisciplinary collaboration. It aimed to investigate the feasibility of genome sequencing and functional genomics to resolve variants of uncertain significance in the clinical management of patients and families with cardiomyopathies, primary arrhythmias, and congenital heart disease.
The rise of sedimentary ancient DNA (sedaDNA) studies has opened new possibilities for studying past environments. This groundbreaking area of genomics uses sediments to identify organisms, even in cases where macroscopic remains no longer exist. Managing this substrate in Indigenous Australian contexts, however, requires special considerations. Sediments and soils are often considered as waste by-products during archaeological and paleontological excavations and are not typically regulated by the same ethics guidelines utilised in mainstream 'western' research paradigms.
Current differentiation protocols have not been successful in reproducibly generating fully functional human beta cells in vitro, partly due to incomplete understanding of human pancreas development. Here, we present detailed transcriptomic analysis of the various cell types of the developing human pancreas, including their spatial gene patterns. We integrated single-cell RNA sequencing with spatial transcriptomics at multiple developmental time points and revealed distinct temporal-spatial gene cascades.
To describe the perspectives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and health care workers on genomics in cancer care to inform the National Framework for Genomics in Cancer Control (the Framework).
Whole genome sequencing offers significant potential to improve the diagnosis and treatment of rare diseases by enabling the identification of thousands of rare, potentially pathogenic variants. Existing variant prioritisation tools can be complemented by approaches that incorporate phenotype specificity and provide contextual biological information, such as tissue or cell-type specificity.
The Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (GA4GH) Phenopacket Schema was released in 2022 and approved by ISO as a standard for sharing clinical and genomic information about an individual, including phenotypic descriptions, numerical measurements, genetic information, diagnoses, and treatments. A phenopacket can be used as an input file for software that supports phenotype-driven genomic diagnostics and for algorithms that facilitate patient classification and stratification for identifying new diseases and treatments.
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) results from gene-environment interactions over the lifetime. These interactions are captured by epigenetic changes, such as DNA methylation.
In Australia, cancer medicine is increasingly guided by our expanding knowledge of cancer genomics (the study of genetic information) and biology. Personalized treatments and targets are often defined by an individual’s genetic profile—known as precision cancer medicine. The translation of genomics-guided precision therapeutics from bench to bedside is beginning to produce real clinical benefits for Australians living with cancer.