Emma Snapes, INFANT’s Biobanking Manager received the National Standards Authority of Ireland award at the NSAI Annual Standards Forum in Dublin. The award was in recognition of Emma’s exceptional dedication to standards development.

Emma is the Irish academic representative and International Expert to ISO TC276 for Biotechnology and was instrumental in the development of ISO 20387 (2018): EN, the first dedicated biobanking standard.

Emma is continuing her work with ISO TC276 and is currently working on a technical report that will accompany the biobanking standard to help interpret the requirements for each unique set up.

“I would likely to sincerely thank all the many individuals too numerous to mention in helping promote the Irish biobanking voice and in particular its expression in the horizontal biobanking standard. Encouragingly, this voice was one I often heard echoed back from other countries experts. It is my hope that those who undertake to fulfil the requirements laid out in the standard will realise the value in resultant high quality, reproducible results and timely achievement of research goals. Special thanks to my biobanking colleague and dear friend, Dr Aisling Doyle, who accompanied me to the award ceremony in Dublin. Aisling and I work closely together and together provide constant round the clock support for INFANT’s biobanking concerns. I remain ever grateful to INFANT directorship and UCC management for enabling her to partake in standards creation”.

Well done Emma!

INFANT research matters

A huge thanks to everyone who contacted us or campaigned to raise awareness about INFANT over the last few weeks. Your generosity and support is extraordinary and we are immensely grateful. We want you to know that the INFANT team is determined to continue delivering high impact and vitally important research for the benefit of women and children in Ireland and worldwide.

Geraldine Boylan

Director, INFANT Research Centre

New Research by INFANT PhD candidate, Gwinyai Masukume has been published in Scientific Reports.

The work is exploring the association between Caesarean Section (CS) and childhood obesity. Childhood obesity has been linked to CS via lack of exposure to vaginal microflora although the literature is inconsistent. The team investigated the association between CS birth and the risk of childhood obesity using the nationally representative Growing-Up-in-Ireland (GUI) cohort.

The study recruited 11134 infants. The exposure was categorised into normal vaginal birth (VD) [reference], assisted VD, elective (planned) CS and emergency (unplanned) CS.

After further analysis of the infants weight and height the team found insufficient evidence to support a causal relationship between elective CS and childhood obesity.

FULL PAPER HERE: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-33482-z

Our research partners, Incereb Ltd, manufacturer of the neon neonatal EEG electrode array, have been aquired by Lifelines Neurodiagnostic Systems, Inc., provider of neurodiagnostic equipment and services.

Simon Griffin, CEO of Lifelines, noted, “We have been working with Incereb for several years in the US market, and their neon product is a perfect fit with our technology and growth plans. We are very excited not only to work with Jim Roche and Incereb on new product development but also with the INFANT Centre at University College Cork and the fantastic research being performed there under the stewardship of Professor Geraldine Boylan.”

Jim Roche, CEO of Incereb, noted “We have worked with Professor Geraldine Boylan since the formation of Incereb, and as an industry partner in INFANT. With LIfelines as our partners, and with their technology fitting seamlessly with Incerebs technology, we are now able to offer a complete EEG monitoring solution for the ICU”.

Incereb will remain operating in Dublin as a subsidiary of the Lifelines group of companies. Plans are to increase R&D spending on a new product pipeline and grow the business by developing new markets and product lines.

“This is a perfect fit for Incereb in terms of our product offering and Lifelines’ sales and distribution network,” says Incereb CEO, Jim Roche, of the acquisition. Incereb has been working with Lifelines since 2015 to distribute Incereb in the US, and more recently worldwide.

“Declan O’Mahoney, Incereb director, has worked tirelessly with the management team consisting of Simon Forsyth, Paul Phillips, and me to get Incereb to this next stage of its evolution,” says Roche. “We are delighted with this acquisition and look forward to growing our business and product range together to bring neonatal and intensive care neuroprotective monitoring to the next level.”

Our PhD researcher, Rachel Williamson, won a Young Investigator Award from the Preeclampsia Foundation at the ISSHP European Conference in Amsterdam.

Eleni Tsiagas of the Preeclampsia Foundation and Rachel Williamson, winner of the Young Investigator Award, ISSHP 2018

Rachel’s presentation at the conference is entitled Investigating the Therapeutic Effects of L-Ergothionine As A Treatment for Pre-eclampsia 

Abstract:

Pre-eclampsia is proposed to result from placental ischemia, explosing the placenta to elevated levels of oxidative stress. L-Ergothionine is a natural water-soluble compound derived from histidine and is a physiological antioxidant due to its preferential concentration in high oxidative stress organs. L- Ergothionine has been shown to possess antioxidant, cytoprotective and anti-inflammatory effects, establishing its potential as a treatment for preeclampsia.

Objectives: To investigate the therapeutic effects of L- Ergothionine as a treatment for preeclampsia using the in-vivo reduced uterine perfusion pressure (RUPP) rat model.

Methods: L- Ergothionine (25mg/kg/day) was administered on gestational day 11 (GD11). RUPP was induced by placing silver clips on the abdominal aorta and the ovarian arteries on GD14. Mean arterial blood pressure (MABP) and vascular function were measured in all four groups. Pup and placental weights were also measured. Data is presented using the mean ± SD.

Results: L- Ergothionine reduced MABP in the group compaed to RUPP controls (134 mmHg  143 mmHg). There was a significant reduction in pup weight in RUPP control group compared to sham controls (1.802± 0.07 v 2.245 ± 0.06, P>0.0001). L- Ergothionine resuced fetal growth restriction in the RUPP group compared with the RUPP control group (2.048 ± 0.09 v 1.802 ± 0.07, P=0.05). Mesenteric arteries from the RUPP control group displayed impaired vasorelaxation, however pre-treatment with L- Ergothionine ameliorated this endothelial dysfunction.

Conclusion: Pre-treatment with L- Ergothionine in the RUPP model mediated some of the pathophysiological characteristics of pre-eclampsia, therefore, highlighting its potential as a treatment for pre-eclampsia.

As published in the Irish Examiner: 

Prof Geraldine Boylan, INFANT co-founder and director, and Professor of Neurophysiology at UCC, says it is vital to continue research into maternal and child health.

INFANT is Ireland’s only dedicated research centre spanning maternal and child health and has been recognised internationally as a world-leading organisation that is responsible for a number of research breakthroughs and life-saving science for mothers and babies.

We have made ground-breaking discoveries in neonatal seizure detection, pre-eclampsia, neonatal brain injury, maternal nutrition, and childhood allergy. INFANT has been at the heart of perinatal research and innovation for more than five years.

Funding from Science Foundation Ireland in 2013 was catalytic to the success of the INFANT Centre, and once  it was established, it was quickly recognised as a global force for development in perinatal healthcare and research.

Competitive research grants, collaboration requests and philanthropic funding from national and international sources supplemented the initial €6 million in start-up funding to grow to its €30 million portfolio today.

Prof Geraldine Boylan, INFANT Director 

Over the last five years, the INFANT Centre has been a high performing SFI research centre and it will continue working in this important area. INFANT is maturing and has a new ambitious programme that will build on the investment and success to date. This will require even more diversity of funding than before but the centre is confident of realising the initial vision of building an Institute of Maternal and Child Health of scale, impact and international.

For example, a number of new large-scale research programmes have been announced this Summer. INFANT is a lead partner in the Connect4Children network in Ireland, a European consortium developing paediatric clinical trials around the world which has one of the largest funding budgets (€140 million) awarded through the EU Innovative Medicines Initiative 2.

There is excellent paediatric research ongoing all over Ireland and the paediatric clinical trial infrastructure being built across Ireland will enable INFANT and its partners to access future funding to develop and test medicines specifically for children and infants.

Up to now, children and infants generally receive ‘smaller doses’ or a dilution of adult medicine rather than specifically designed treatments. One of INFANT’s key goals is to support the use of innovative trial designs and new quantitative methods to foster the development of paediatric medicines and to support research in rare paediatric diseases and high medical need areas.

INFANT is the only national research centre of scale working across the continuum of pregnant women, babies and young children.

INFANT as a clinical and translational centre must combine basic and applied research on real unmet clinical needs with a drive to bring innovations and solutions to these clinical problems to the market.

We do this by working with a wide range of stakeholders and funders — clinicians, scientists, engineers, industry, government, funding agencies, donors and patients.

We will continue to collaborate with these partners — local, national and international.

UCC is committed to ensuring that INFANT continues to grow, flourish and deliver on the tremendous impact it can bring to science and society. Ireland and Cork in particular has a unique competitive advantage for research and innovation in perinatal health.

The INFANT Centre continues to be committed to scientific excellence and impactful research. We will continue to work directly with many funders, collaborators and philanthropists and their foundations on this lifesaving and life-changing work in the area of neonatal and maternal care. We look forward to the continued collaboration with families who are the cornerstone of this effort.

As director, I am very proud to lead this important research centre. We are indebted to the wonderful families who take part in our research and I am very proud of the community of researchers and staff in INFANT who are so committed to making things better for mothers and babies around the world.

Following an SFI Research Centre programme call for funding, the new proposal of the INFANT Centre at UCC has not been funded at this time but instead has been recommended to proceed to a national open call in 2020. The Centre opened in 2013 with initial funding from Science Foundation Ireland, which will end in May 2019. INFANT will continue its research work funded by a diverse range of national and international funding agencies, industry partners and philanthropic donors.

INFANT’s mission is to improve health outcomes for mothers and babies by focusing on clinical and health research and innovation in pregnancy, birth and early childhood. The Centre has grown rapidly from its initial award of €6M to over €30M in five years comprising donations, competitive funding awards, and global partnerships with industry and academic researchers which  has enabled the development of INFANT to the point where it now has over 100 staff, a dedicated paediatric clinical research unit, an internationally recognised biobank, a world-leading data hub and other clinical research infrastructure in obstetrics and neonatology.

The support from SFI for the Centre has, to date, been a significant catalyst for major growth and development. It has allowed INFANT to develop breakthroughs in seizure detection and in areas such as pre-eclampsia diagnosis, maternal and new-born nutrition and allergy. The Centre will continue to develop these areas and support maternal and child health research and innovation in its next phase for the benefit of mums, babies and children in Ireland and worldwide.