Project description
Personal control over certain genetic mediators of mental health
Changes in gene expression caused by environmental factors like chemicals, diet or stress can be passed down to future generations. This phenomenon, known as epigenetics, is due to modifications in molecules that affect gene expression rather than by changes to the gene’s DNA sequence. The ERC-funded EM-POWER project aims to reveal the potential of personal control over environmental factors to protect mental health, and break the perceived barrier of genetic vulnerability. To do so, it will use its new multivariate method to identify shared genetic effects across thousands of variables in combination with genetically informed causal models and family designs. EM-POWER will lay the foundations for a new non-deterministic biological paradigm.
Objective
"Mental health problems are associated with variation in the brain and genome. The mechanisms underlying these associations are extremely hard to discern because they are subtly distributed across thousands of genes and not specific to neural processes. Meanwhile, a focus on biology tends to induce feelings of helplessness among those affected by mental health problems, as biology is typically seen as deterministic. I propose that both our mechanistic understanding and the sense of personal agency will leap forward if we consider modifiable, heritable social and lifestyle factors (i.e. ""environment"") centrally within the causal chain from genes to brain to mental health.
Environmental factors are known to be heritable, yet a bottom-up gene-brain causal model prevails due to its intuitive and practical appeal. Standard methods are limited to pairwise associations between the many relevant genetic, brain and environmental variables. The heritable environment is thus hard to account for, let alone embrace as an opportunity. We developed a new multivariate method that can identify patterns of shared genetic effects across thousands of variables. By combining this method with genetically informed causal models and family designs, we will reveal the overall explanatory power and pervasiveness of environment-mediated genetic influences on brain and mental health. We will further characterise these to identify which environmental factors are potential mediators of genetic influences on brain and mental health, when they emerge, and if and how they are personally modifiable.
The goal of EM-POWER is to lay empirical foundations for a new non-deterministic biological paradigm, that leads to new mechanistic insights of environment-mediated biological mechanisms, within this project and beyond. The future outcome is that people know the potential of personal control over biological factors and can break causal chains from genetic vulnerability to mental health problems."
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2024-COG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
6525 GA NIJMEGEN
Netherlands
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.