#OMFScienceWednesday share the highlights from this week’s Stanford Genome Technology Center (SGTC) research conference, an annual event where Dr. Ron Davis’ team assembles to share their results and discuss the future of their research. An entire session was dedicated to ME / CFS research, with additional sessions on SGTC’s core work in synthetic biology, genomics approaches to disease, and diagnostic technologies.
During the ME / CFS session, there were updates on the Severely Ill Patient Study, funded by OMF. Wenzhong Xiao, PhD, showed that: 1) SF-36 scores are worse in ME / CFS than several major diseases and correlate the least with depression and mental illnesses; 2) 21 cytokines are different between ME / CFS patients and controls; 3) 27 clinical tests are different between patients and controls, including low morning cortisol in patients; 4) 63 metabolites are different between patients and controls; and 5) ME / CFS bears strong similarities to systemic inflammatory response syndrome.
This is a massive dataset that offers many additional opportunities for analysis. Several ideas were discussed at the conference’s breakout sessions, including how to apply mathematical modeling, genetic analysis, comparing to other diseases, and more. The full dataset is being opened up to the research community to accelerate these efforts! Check out the full list of tests that were run in this study: /phase-i-list-of-tests/
Laurel Crosby, PhD, pointed out how far the ME / CFS research at SGTC has come thanks to the support of OMF: from just one patient and no funding a few years ago, to dozens of patients, numerous new datasets, a rich network of collaborators, and funds for both personnel and experiments. The whole team is so grateful for this support and the scientific possibilities it offers!
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