Mendelian Randomization Workshop

Theme: Mendelian randomization for drug discovery in Africa

Venue: 

African Center for Translational Genomics (ACTG), Lekki-Lagos, Nigeria

Format: In person (Physical)

The Mendelian Randomization Workshop is a five-day intensive combination of seminars and hands-on analytical sessions to provide an overview of the concepts, techniques, packages, data sources, and data analysis methods needed to conduct Mendelian Randomization studies.     

Eligibility:
Investigators at all career stages (MSc/PhD/Post-Doc and Early Career stage) interested in learning basic concept of Mendelian Randomization especially trainees from H3Africa and H3ABioNet are welcome to attend. Experience in GWAS data analysis, plus scripting in R and bash are essential. 

Application Deadline: 24 December, 2022

Course Fees: FREE
Apply here: https://bit.ly/34J8hUC

Workshop Overview
In epidemiology, Mendelian randomization studies are increasingly being used to distinguish causal from observational associations and to choose prospective targets for pharmaceutical intervention. In this field, African researchers have limited experience. The goal of this workshop is to close the knowledge gap among Africans Scientists. This five-day intensive workshop integrates motivation for Mendelian randomization studies, statistical concepts, genetic considerations, and practical examples to design, implement and interpret a Mendelian randomization analysis. The workshop will integrate seminar lectures with hands-on computer sessions to put concepts into practice. Emphasis will be given to leveraging existing publicly available resources (data, tools and packages) as well as indicating the scope for new studies. The lab sessions will provide an opportunity to work hands-on with real data. Participants will learn and practice all the steps required for a successful Mendelian randomization analysis using publicly available data, including identifying suitable data sources, data extraction, data alignment, assumption checking and sensitivity analysis. 

By the end of the course, the participant should be able to:
⦁ Understand the general concept of Mendelian Randomisation and statistical approaches building on that framework
⦁ Run their own analysis, interpret the results, and critically read the literature.
⦁ Investigate the effects of drug target perturbation for different indications and explore potential adverse effects and repurposing

Organizers:
Prof. Oyekanmi Nash CGRI/NABDA, Abuja, Nigeria
Prof. Nicky Mulder H3ABioNet/UCT, Cape Town, South Africa

Trainers:
Dr. Segun Fatumo MRC/UVRI Uganda and LSHTM, UK
Dr. Tinashe Chikowore Uni. of the Witwatersrand, South Africa
Dr. Opeyemi Soremekun MRC/UVRI and LSHTM, Uganda
Dr, Olaposi Omotuyi Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria