Identification of protein-profiles to characterise pre-clinical phases of inflammatory bowel disease and to predict the disease (PreClin-IBD)

What (Purpose and Aim) To define the early stages of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) development, I will identify pre-clinical phases of IBD based on protein profiles and examine their ability to predictive future manifest IBD.

How By using existing biobanks, I will I) identify pre-diagnostic protein profiles from asymptomatic individuals in the Northern Sweden Health and Disease Study (NSHDS) cohort who later in life develop IBD, II) examine the influence of genetic and environmental risk factors on these profiles in the IBD twin cohort, III) identify predictive signatures of manifest IBD in the NSHDS cohort and validate them in the “Malmö kost och cancer” cohort.

In addition, I will examine the predictive relevance of these signatures to inform about long-term disease course in two IBD inception cohorts. Serum protein profiles are generated by proximity extension assay technology. Predictive models are built from integration of demographic, protein and existing genomic data.

The project will be performed by my research group together with collaborators, during 2021-2025. Why The project will provide a pre-clinical classification of IBD, ultimately to be used for prevention of the disease.