Group of Clinical Genomic Networks – Christine Nardini

Department of  Combinatorics and Geometry - CAS-MPG Partner Institute for Computational Biology

Christine Nardini, PhD – Principal Investigator

Address: Room #334, 2nd Floor
PICB 320 Yue Yang Road, 200031 Shanghai, PRC
Tel: +86 21 54920485

www: www.picb.ac.cn/ClinicalGenomicNTW
e-mail: christine (#)picb(*)ac(*)cn

The above address is meant to avoid spam spiders
turn the (#) into a @ and the (*) into a .

current position

2008-now. Principal Investigator at PICB CAS-MPG (Chinese Academy of Science – German Max Plank Society), in Shanghai (China)

2006- 2008. Research Assistant at the Department of Electronic Informatics and Systems (DEIS) at the University of Bologna (Italy).

EDUCATION

2003-2005 - PhD in Electronics and Informatics at University of Bologna. Thesis Title: “Statistical-Computational Techniques for Extraction of Functional Genomic Units from Microarray Experiments”. Supervisor: Prof. Luca Benini.

1999 National Habilitation to Engineers Professional Activity.

1992-1998 –Master Degree in Electrical Engineering – Biomedical specialization at the University of Bologna (90/100). Thesis title: “Identification of non-linear dynamics through space and time dependent neural networks”. Tutor: Prof. Mauro Ursino

1992 – BS Degree at Istituto N. Copernico in Bologna (60/60).

INterniships & COLLABORATIONS

Collaborator at the Telethon Institute for Genetics and Medicine (TIGEM) in Naples.

Collaboration with Unità di Genetica Medica del Policlinco S. Orsola (Bologna, Italy) and European Genetic Foundation (EGF).

Collaboration with Embryology Department and DAMA (DAta Mining and Analysis) Telethon Facility at University of Ferrara (Italy) for research on multigenic hereditary diseases.

Collaboration with Ecole Polythecnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, CH) on Data Mining for high throughput biological sensors.

Internship and collaboration with The Center for Translational Medical Systems at University of California San Diego (UCSD, USA), with Michael D. Kuo, MD, for the bioinformatics side of the development of Radiogenomics.

Visiting researcher at the Computer Science Department at Stanford University (CA, USA), with Prof Giovanni de Micheli. For the development of data mining algorithms to be applied to microarrays for gene expression analyses.

Research activity

Current: See Here

Past:

Synthetic Biology: project, design and construction of a genetic Schmitt Trigger for applications in molecular biology and eventually medicine (presented at the international Genetically Engineered Machine Competition, iGEM2007). Funded by SYNBIOCOM, European Grant.

Multigenic Hereditary Diseases research. In collaboration with the Genetic Medical Unit at S..Orsola Hospital in Bologna and with Data Mining of DNA microarray (DAMA) Telethon Facility at Ferrara University. We developed generated an approach enabling geneticists to narrow down to a few candidates the focus of gene hunting for multigenic pathologies. The approach is based on the implementation of an original pipeline of statistical tests for the generation of a global statistical score for the evaluation of the similarity among gene clusters of different origins. Funded by PRIN 2004, National Grant.

Gene-Network Reverse-Engineering. In collaboration with Telethon Institute for Genetic Medicine (TIGEM) in Naples, contribution to the definition of ordinary differential equation based approaches to inference of gene network based on steady-state microarray data .

Clinical Genomics. In collaboration with The Center for Translational Medical Systems at UCSD, contribution to the bioinformatics side of the discovery of molecular surrogates in the diagnosis of brain tumors Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM). Several solution and approaches have been devised or adapted to further characterize the relationship between the molecular and radiological paradigm, including the definition of alternative approaches for the selection of meaningful genes extracted from high throughput experiments, accounting for the problem of the multiple hypothesis correction.

Data Mining. In collaboration with the CS department at Stanford University, development and implementation of a bi-clustering algorithm, to group genes with similar behavior based on activation profiles measured with microarray experiments. Bi-clustering algorithms, conversely to traditional clustering algorithms, allow the extraction of co-expressed genes, working simultaneously on genes and samples dimension. The algorithms uses Zero-Suppressed Binary Decision Diagrams.

TEACHING

2006-2008 Professor for the module on bioinformatics for systems biology for the course “Biosensori” at the University of Bologna for Master Degree in Bioinformatics at the Faculty of Mathematics Physics and Natural Sciences. For information and program see here (official website) and here (lectures material)).

Seminars and talks

November 2007 – Speaker at the meeting on ‘Nanotechnologies and Biomedical Application’s, organized by ScienzaE, no-profit association for the diffusion of scientific and technological culture, with a talk on ‘Synthetic biology for Community Service‘.

Academic Year 2006-2007 – Seminar on introduction to Systems Biology in the course “Integrated Course on Nanobiotechnologies and Biosensors” of Professor B. Riccò at the University of Bologna for the degree in Molecular and Industrial Biotechnologies.

November 2006 – Conference RSNA Radiological Society of North America, Faculty for the refresher course ‘Integrating Cancer Genomics and Radiological Imaging: Practical Answers to Complex Problems (How-to Workshop)’

Academic Year 2006-2007 – Seminar on in introduction to Systems Biology in the course “Hardware Software Project Methodologies” of Professor L. Benini at the University of Bologna for the Electronic Degree at the Engineering Faculty.

December 2005 – Presentation on “Overview on high-throughput devices in the post-genomic era. Focus on microarrays current applications and data mining tools” at the 3 days meeting Focus on Biotechnologies held in Milan 14-15-16 December.

Academic Year 2005-2006 – in charge of the Data mining section of the course ‘Biosensors’ of Professor L. Benini at the university of Bologna for the Bioinformatics Degree in the Faculty of Mathematics Physics and Natural Sciences.

Academic Year 2005-2006 – Seminar on statistics applied to Microarray in the course “Hardware Software Project Methodologies” of Professor L. Benini at the University of Bologna for the Electronic Degree at the Engineering Faculty.

Academic Year 2004-2005 - Seminar on Data Mining applied to Microarray in the course “Hardware Software Project Methodologies” of Professor L. Benini at the University of Bologna for the Electronic Degree at the Engineering Faculty.

Academic Year 2002-2003 – Seminar on Data Mining applied to Microarray in the course: “Information systems” of professor P. Ciaccia at the University of Bologna for the Electronic Degree at the Engineering Faculty.

PUBLICATIONS

See here