2022 Participants
Imogen Hardwick
Fifteen million babies are born preterm every year[1]. These individuals have an increased risk of developing serious health conditions as their organ systems are often underdeveloped upon birth[2]. One crucial organ affected is the heart. Therefore, it is vital to understand how the heart develops normally from fetal stages to adulthood in order to identify differences in individuals born early. My aim in this project is to investigate changes in inhibitory troponin (TnI) expression during healthy heart development. TnI functions to regulate contraction and relaxation of the heart. Different forms of TnI exist (slow-skeletal TnI -TNNI1, cardiac TnI -TNNI3) and exhibit slightly different functional properties. Experimentation revealed an inverse relationship between TNNI1 and TNNI3 during heart development. TNNI1 was predominantly expressed in fetal tissue whereas TNNI3 dominated in adult tissue. These findings can be used to identify developmental abnormalities in individuals born preterm and target treatment for this population.
References
[1] Preterm birth [Internet]. WHO. 2022 [cited 19 September 2022]. Available from: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/preterm-birth
[2] Taggart MJ, Tribe RM. Physiological resilience across the lifecourse: in utero and beyond. Exp Physiol. 2022;107(5):395-7.
Funding source: Physiological Society
Project Supervisor: Professor Michael Taggart