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Headlines 7 Dr Sophie Farrow is a researcher based at University of Auckland’s Liggins Institute who is funded by the Michael J Fox Foundation to study Parkinson’s disease (PD) and genetics. Her early-career research was supported by a Neurological Foundation Small Project Grant. R esults from her research, recently published in the neurology journal Brain , are helping to guide personalised approaches to Parkinson’s treatments based on an individual’s genetic variations. So far, researchers have identified 240 genetic differences in people with PD. However, how these differences may contribute to developing the disease remains largely unknown. Dr Farrow has been helping to fill this knowledge gap by looking at how the genetic mutations found in PD patients interact with each other, and with other genes, in the development and progression of the disease. To do this she uses an elegant combination of computational modelling and laboratory experiments to visualise how these mutations appear in the human genome and how they behave. The results, recently published in the neurology journal Brain , showed that 76 of the genetic mutations present in individuals with PD were potentially affecting an incredible 518 different genes throughout the body. Many were far from the brain, for instance the heart or the bowel, and several of the biological pathways had not been previously linked to PD. One of the genetic mutations was shown to affect the PARK20 gene, which contributes to familial, or inherited, PD – reinforcing that the disease must have a strong genetic component to its development. This study also identified that the genetic mutations were affecting genes during neuro-development in the womb, suggesting that the development of PD is beginning much earlier than previously thought. This project has contributed an exceptional level of new information to the field of PD research, and helps to inform how individual treatment strategies could be used to guide a more personalised approach to disease management. IT’S NOT ALL IN YOUR HEAD Groundbreaking genetic research shows Parkinson’s disease is not just confined to the brain About Sophie Dr Sophie Farrow completed her PhD in 2022 and is currently a post-doctoral fellow in Professor Justin O’Sullivan’s lab at the University of Auckland’s Liggins Institute. She studies the role of genetic regulatory variants in the development of Parkinson’s disease, among other complex diseases, using high-throughput computational and laboratory techniques. DIGITAL EVENT It’s not all in your head Join Dr Farrow on Zoom Tuesday 13 June 7pm To register visit: bit.ly/3Mg2wAM