The Health Minister, Lord O’Shaughnessy, visited the NIHR Oxford BRC on Wednesday 30 May to take a look at the ground-breaking research that is taking place in the fields of cancer and genomics. He was accompanied on the tour by Oxford BRC Director Prof Keith Channon and Head of Research Operations Dr Vasiliki Kiparoglou. Lord O’Shaughnessy … Read more
News for Genomic Medicine
New funding allows John Radcliffe to expand testing for deadly heart conditions
Thousands more people nationally – and hundreds in our region – could be screened for deadly inherited heart conditions at the John Radcliffe Hospital after it received a grant to expand a genetic testing service. The funding from the Miles Frost Fund and the British Heart Foundation (BHF) was announced at the John Radcliffe on … Read more
England world leaders in the use of Whole Genome Sequencing to diagnose TB
In a world-first, Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) is now being used to identify different strains of tuberculosis, announced Public Health England today. This is the first time that WGS has been used as a diagnostic solution for managing a disease on this scale anywhere in the world. This builds on WGS based services for public … Read more
New trial for blindness rewrites the genetic code
Researchers have started a new gene therapy clinical trial to treat X-linked retinitis pigmentosa (XLRP), the most common cause of blindness in young people. Retinitis pigmentosa is currently untreatable and leads to a slow and irreversible loss of vision. On 16 March 2017, a 29-year-old British man became the first patient with X-linked retinitis pigmentosa … Read more
Genetic sequencing offers same-day TB testing
Researchers have for the first time shown that standard tuberculosis (TB) diagnostic tests can be replaced by a sub-24 hour genetic test applied to the TB bacteria in a patient’s sputum. It currently takes up to two months to obtain the full diagnostic information for a patient with TB, as the bacteria grow very slowly … Read more
Public Health Minister Visits Oxford Cancer Hospital ahead of World Cancer Day
Ahead of World Cancer Day on February, Public Health Minister Nicola Blackwood highlighted the importance of UK scientific research to beating cancer during a visit to the Churchill Hospital. The Public Health and Innovation Minister saw state-of-the-art clinical trials and facilities for new cancer treatments and patients, both supported by the NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research … Read more
Funding boost for genetics centre
A major University of Oxford genetics research centre that supports Oxford BRC research is to share £118m of new funding. Global medical research funding charity Wellcome has announced funding for The Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics. The aim of the centre is to advance understanding of health and disease, and span fundamental and social sciences, … Read more
Nanopore genetics breakthrough supported by Oxford BRC
Oxford University’s Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics (WTCHG) and the leading genome analytics company Genomics plc has announced the first sequencing and analysis of multiple human genomes using nanopore technology. The announcement, made on Thursday, December 1, at the Oxford Nanopore Community Meeting in New York City, marks a major breakthrough in sequencing technology … Read more
How baby’s genes influence birth weight and later life disease
New research finds genetic differences that help to explain why some babies are born bigger or smaller than others. It also reveals how genetic differences provide an important link between an individual’s early growth and their chances of developing conditions such as type 2 diabetes or heart disease in later life. The large-scale study, published … Read more
Parents back genetics project at one year milestone
Parents who want to understand the cause of their infant daughter’s immune deficiency are among more than 1,000 people who participated in the first full year of a ground-breaking NHS genetics project in Oxford. Kevin and Corinne Kirk hope a simple blood sample from daughter Evie, two, could help unlock the mysteries of her … Read more