Researchers at the University of Turku discovered a microRNA that may be an early indicator of the risk of developing type 1 diabetes.
Professor Laura Elo and her research group for computational biomedicine at the University of Turku are developing tools for the diagnosis and treatment of complex diseases, such as diabetes, cancer and rheumatoid arthritis. The group screens patient data using computational methods to find signs of diseases and their risk factors.
Elo, Research Director at the Turku Bioscience Centre, is mining patient data for various biomarkers that may help predict the onset of diseases or tell something about the response to treatment. A biomarker is a feature that indicates a change in a biological state, in genes or proteins, for example.
According to Elo, future study of diseases should make use of the various ‘omics’, such as genomics (DNA), proteomics (proteins), transcriptomics (RNA) or metabolomics (metabolism). Elo’s group has been using the computing resources of Finland’s ELIXIR Center CSC to process the extensive data.
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CSC – IT Center for Science
is a non-profit, state-owned company administered by the Ministry of Education and Culture. CSC maintains and develops the state-owned, centralised IT infrastructure.
https://research.csc.fi/cloud-computing
ELIXIR
builds infrastructure in support of the biological sector. It brings together the leading organisations of 21 European countries and the EMBL European Molecular Biology Laboratory to form a common infrastructure for biological information. CSC – IT Center for Science is the Finnish centre within this infrastructure.
ELIXIR is partly funded by the European Commission