VPH NoE Exemplar Projects and the VPH ToolKit - 3. The Vertical and Horizontal Atherome (WHAM) PDF | Print | E-mail

Article Index
VPH NoE Exemplar Projects and the VPH ToolKit
1. A multi-organ Core Model of arterial pressure and body fluids homeostasis
2. Integrated multi-level modelling of the musculoskeletal system
3. The Vertical and Horizontal Atherome (WHAM)
4. Multi-scale simulation and prediction of the drug safety problems related with hERG
5. Digital Patient Working Group: Modelling and visualising brain function and pathophysiology
6. Establishing ontology-based methods for the VPH ToolKit to improve interoperability between data and models: the Guyton case study
7. CIGENE: Integrating genetic theory and genomic data with multiscale models in a population context
8. USFD: The NoE, Infrastructure and the Challenge of Call6
9. VIP for VPH : Execution of medical image simulation workflows on DEISA through workflow interoperability between the Virtual Imaging Platform and the VPH toolkit
10. Environment for Sexually Transmitted Infection Modeling
11. Vascular Tissue Modeling Environment (VTME)
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3. The Vertical and Horizontal Atherome (WHAM)

Lead: KI, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

 

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is a major (50 %) killer of the western population. Atherosclerosis is a main driver of CAD and it would be advantageous if the suffering from this disease could be reduced. Due to the western life style there are however no indications that atherosclerosis will become less important in the future. Yet, our limited mechanistic understanding of the disease in terms of the identity of the disease related genes, polymorphisms, proteins, and their interactions, within and between cells and organs, constitute a severe bottleneck in preventing and developing efficient drugs which can regress the development of atherosclerosis.

The WHAM program requires both a vertical and horizontal integration. Available vertical data ranges from molecular information (gene-expression, protein-protein interactions data) to angiograms (imaging) reflecting degree of disease from patients undergoing by-pass surgery. Horizontal molecular information is obtained from tissue biopsies (liver, muscle, fat, affected and unaffected aorta). Similar data-types are available from the aorta from a mouse model prone for atherosclerosis. Molecular data from macrophages a key cell-type involved in atherosclerosis are also available.

To analyze these data from different organs, and model systems of different complexity a blend of pattern detection techniques (statistics, machine learning), network identification algorithms and mathematical modelling is required.

This seed EP will aim to harness the development of the VPH ToolKit (WP3) and accelerate the success of WHAM, since such features have not been developed within the WHAM project itself, this being a clinical and experimental project that was launched and run without these considerations in mind. Therefore, VPH tools enabling "simple" things like storing different types of data (patient descriptions, experimental protocols, expression, SNPs etc) are urgently needed. At the other end of the spectrum the issue of integrating the molecular information obtained across different model systems and imaging is most likely a central methodological problem for a VPH ToolKit addressing clinical needs. This includes visualisation but also how molecule X affects the tissue and 3D properties etc., interaction between flow (blood) and expression of various molecules.