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Other Leicester events

Signal Failure

There are four steps down to the venue. Advance ticket purchases recommended.
Past event - 2019
20 May Doors 7:00pm
Event 7.30-9.30pm
4 steps to venue
The Lansdowne, 123 London Rd,
Leicester LE2 0QT
Join us for a night at The Lansdowne to find out how researchers at University of Leicester are finding answers to crucial health questions from our DNA patterns and architectures.

Attendees get Happy Hour prices!

Breathless genes: The lung and the short of it

Professor Martin Tobin (Professor of Genetic Epidemiology and Public Health, Leicester Precision Medicine Institute)
The ability to study our DNA at scale provides new ways to understand why long term health conditions develop and how to treat them effectively. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is the second most common cause of emergency hospital admissions in the UK and affects 1.2 million people. Why do some smokers develop COPD and others do not? Why are one-fifth of people with COPD non-smokers? These answers lie in large part in our DNA. I will describe how we undertake our research and the clues it provides us, and how these clues can lead to new, improved medicines.

Cancer and ageing: Why the ends of chromosomes matter.

Dr Nicola Royle (Associate Professor in the Department of Genetics and Genome Biology, University of Leicester)
DNA in human cells is packaged into 23 pairs of chromosomes; one from each parent. The ends of chromosomes are called telomeres. These structures can be a double-edged sword. Telomeres can stop ‘old’ cells that might contain cancer from dividing, but old cells accumulate as we age and contribute to tissue deterioration. This is further complicated because cancer cells must actively maintain telomeres to grow and spread. The evidence that telomere length is linked to age is strong but the relationship is complex. Now people can pay to have their telomeres measured - but is it money well spent?
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