Isy Foote
@isyfoote.bsky.social
Postdoc @ IBG, Colorado. Research interests: ageing, frailty, dementia, genetic epidemiology & preventive medicine 🏳️🌈
Reposted by Isy Foote
First time on Bsky and first big announcement!
I am excited to announce that our new study explaining the missing heritability of many phenotypes using WGS data from ~347,000 UK Biobank participants has just been published in @Nature.
Our manuscript is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41....
I am excited to announce that our new study explaining the missing heritability of many phenotypes using WGS data from ~347,000 UK Biobank participants has just been published in @Nature.
Our manuscript is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41....
Estimation and mapping of the missing heritability of human phenotypes - Nature
WGS data were used from 347,630 individuals with European ancestry in the UK Biobank to obtain high-precision estimates of coding and non-coding rare variant heritability for 34 co...
www.nature.com
November 12, 2025 at 5:57 PM
First time on Bsky and first big announcement!
I am excited to announce that our new study explaining the missing heritability of many phenotypes using WGS data from ~347,000 UK Biobank participants has just been published in @Nature.
Our manuscript is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41....
I am excited to announce that our new study explaining the missing heritability of many phenotypes using WGS data from ~347,000 UK Biobank participants has just been published in @Nature.
Our manuscript is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41....
Reposted by Isy Foote
How do GWAS and rare variant burden tests rank gene signals?
In new work @nature.com with @hakha.bsky.social, @jkpritch.bsky.social, and our wonderful coauthors we find that the key factors are what we call Specificity, Length, and Luck!
🧬🧪🧵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
In new work @nature.com with @hakha.bsky.social, @jkpritch.bsky.social, and our wonderful coauthors we find that the key factors are what we call Specificity, Length, and Luck!
🧬🧪🧵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Specificity, length and luck drive gene rankings in association studies - Nature
Genetic association tests prioritize candidate genes based on different criteria.
www.nature.com
November 7, 2025 at 12:05 AM
How do GWAS and rare variant burden tests rank gene signals?
In new work @nature.com with @hakha.bsky.social, @jkpritch.bsky.social, and our wonderful coauthors we find that the key factors are what we call Specificity, Length, and Luck!
🧬🧪🧵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
In new work @nature.com with @hakha.bsky.social, @jkpritch.bsky.social, and our wonderful coauthors we find that the key factors are what we call Specificity, Length, and Luck!
🧬🧪🧵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Isy Foote
Not all pathogenic variants are in coding regions! 👀
📢 This review highlights Mendelian disease-causing UTR variants, their mechanisms, and implications for clinical interpretation. 🧬 #Mendelian #UTRvariants #ejhg
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
📢 This review highlights Mendelian disease-causing UTR variants, their mechanisms, and implications for clinical interpretation. 🧬 #Mendelian #UTRvariants #ejhg
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
The role of untranslated region variants in Mendelian disease: a review - European Journal of Human Genetics
European Journal of Human Genetics - The role of untranslated region variants in Mendelian disease: a review
www.nature.com
September 12, 2025 at 10:19 AM
Not all pathogenic variants are in coding regions! 👀
📢 This review highlights Mendelian disease-causing UTR variants, their mechanisms, and implications for clinical interpretation. 🧬 #Mendelian #UTRvariants #ejhg
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
📢 This review highlights Mendelian disease-causing UTR variants, their mechanisms, and implications for clinical interpretation. 🧬 #Mendelian #UTRvariants #ejhg
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Isy Foote
A key (too often ignored) aspect of Alzheimer's research is translation of findings between familial disease, specialist clinics, and general population. In this piece we identify key unanswered research questions and describe a framework for knowledge integration.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Key questions for the future of amyloid research in dementia: a framework for integrating complex datasets - Molecular Psychiatry
Molecular Psychiatry - Key questions for the future of amyloid research in dementia: a framework for integrating complex datasets
www.nature.com
September 10, 2025 at 10:54 AM
A key (too often ignored) aspect of Alzheimer's research is translation of findings between familial disease, specialist clinics, and general population. In this piece we identify key unanswered research questions and describe a framework for knowledge integration.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Isy Foote
I'm looking for a PhD student to do some trailblazing at the frontier of personality genomics and lifespan gene-environment transactions (start Fall 2026)! If you want to work with me: psychology.msu.edu/graduatestud...
(PS @drmeltemyucel.bsky.social is taking a student too, in moral psych/dev!)
(PS @drmeltemyucel.bsky.social is taking a student too, in moral psych/dev!)
September 2, 2025 at 3:57 PM
I'm looking for a PhD student to do some trailblazing at the frontier of personality genomics and lifespan gene-environment transactions (start Fall 2026)! If you want to work with me: psychology.msu.edu/graduatestud...
(PS @drmeltemyucel.bsky.social is taking a student too, in moral psych/dev!)
(PS @drmeltemyucel.bsky.social is taking a student too, in moral psych/dev!)
Super cool study looking at understanding age-dependent impacts on genetic variance!!
Excited to share our latest manuscript, "Exposure accumulation drives age-dependent disease architectures and polygenic risk scores," led by Xilin Jiang: www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
I am attempting an explainer thread for the first time here:
(I am usually too exhausted to post one)
I am attempting an explainer thread for the first time here:
(I am usually too exhausted to post one)
Exposure accumulation drives age-dependent disease architectures and polygenic risk scores
Our understanding of the dependence of the genetic and environmental architecture of common diseases on age is incomplete. Here, we use longitudinal data to quantify age-dependent genetic and environm...
www.medrxiv.org
September 4, 2025 at 5:35 AM
Super cool study looking at understanding age-dependent impacts on genetic variance!!
Reposted by Isy Foote
Some recent data:
- First scores for frailty measurements (@isyfoote.bsky.social & @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social): www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
- Comprehensive comparison of type 2 diabetes PGS in Qatari Biobank: www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
Share PGS 👉 www.PGSCatalog.org/submit!
- First scores for frailty measurements (@isyfoote.bsky.social & @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social): www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
- Comprehensive comparison of type 2 diabetes PGS in Qatari Biobank: www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
Share PGS 👉 www.PGSCatalog.org/submit!
PGS Catalog - Foote IF, Nat Genet (2025) (Publication)
The Polygenic Score (PGS) Catalog is an open database of
published PGS and the relevant metadata needed to apply and evaluate them correctly.
www.pgscatalog.org
August 6, 2025 at 3:33 PM
Some recent data:
- First scores for frailty measurements (@isyfoote.bsky.social & @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social): www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
- Comprehensive comparison of type 2 diabetes PGS in Qatari Biobank: www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
Share PGS 👉 www.PGSCatalog.org/submit!
- First scores for frailty measurements (@isyfoote.bsky.social & @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social): www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
- Comprehensive comparison of type 2 diabetes PGS in Qatari Biobank: www.pgscatalog.org/publication/...
Share PGS 👉 www.PGSCatalog.org/submit!
Reposted by Isy Foote
New work in Nature Genetics from IBG members lead by @isyfoote.bsky.social (along with @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social) examining different measures of frailty using Genomic SEM. Findings reveal six genomic factors with unique biological pathways and clinical correlates. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Uncovering the multivariate genetic architecture of frailty with genomic structural equation modeling - Nature Genetics
Multivariate genome-wide association analyses of the latent genetic architecture of frailty identify one general factor of genetic overlap across all frailty deficits and six factors indexing a shared...
www.nature.com
August 6, 2025 at 4:15 PM
New work in Nature Genetics from IBG members lead by @isyfoote.bsky.social (along with @andrewgrotzinger.bsky.social) examining different measures of frailty using Genomic SEM. Findings reveal six genomic factors with unique biological pathways and clinical correlates. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Isy Foote
What evidence do we have on the Social Determinants of Dementia (SDOD)?
Delighted that this scoping review, a year or so in the making, is now published in @alzdemjournals.bsky.social. Expertly led by Anouk Geraets, we identified...
doi.org/10.1002/alz....
1/
Delighted that this scoping review, a year or so in the making, is now published in @alzdemjournals.bsky.social. Expertly led by Anouk Geraets, we identified...
doi.org/10.1002/alz....
1/
July 28, 2025 at 2:07 PM
What evidence do we have on the Social Determinants of Dementia (SDOD)?
Delighted that this scoping review, a year or so in the making, is now published in @alzdemjournals.bsky.social. Expertly led by Anouk Geraets, we identified...
doi.org/10.1002/alz....
1/
Delighted that this scoping review, a year or so in the making, is now published in @alzdemjournals.bsky.social. Expertly led by Anouk Geraets, we identified...
doi.org/10.1002/alz....
1/
Reposted by Isy Foote
Nature research paper: Structural variation in 1,019 diverse humans based on long-read sequencing
go.nature.com/3GI9EWC
go.nature.com/3GI9EWC
Structural variation in 1,019 diverse humans based on long-read sequencing - Nature
Intermediate-coverage long-read sequencing in 1,019 diverse humans from the 1000 Genomes Project, representing 26 populations, enables the generation of comprehensive population-scale structural variant catalogues comprising common and rare alleles.
go.nature.com
July 24, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Nature research paper: Structural variation in 1,019 diverse humans based on long-read sequencing
go.nature.com/3GI9EWC
go.nature.com/3GI9EWC
Reposted by Isy Foote
Differences in physical, social, and sociopolitical factors across the world have resulted in marked disparities in healthy ageing across countries, according to an analysis in Nature Medicine. go.nature.com/3UfJ8GU #medsky 🧪
July 14, 2025 at 7:22 PM
Differences in physical, social, and sociopolitical factors across the world have resulted in marked disparities in healthy ageing across countries, according to an analysis in Nature Medicine. go.nature.com/3UfJ8GU #medsky 🧪
Reposted by Isy Foote
🚨New preprint is out!
How do genetic effects on complex traits change with age? In this work, we compare different approaches to obtain age-varying genetic effects, and show how design and modeling choices can impact the conclusions we draw.
shorturl.at/17snd
A thread 🧵👇
How do genetic effects on complex traits change with age? In this work, we compare different approaches to obtain age-varying genetic effects, and show how design and modeling choices can impact the conclusions we draw.
shorturl.at/17snd
A thread 🧵👇
Design and model choices shape inference of age-varying genetic effects on complex traits
Understanding how genetic influences on complex traits change with age is a fundamental question in genetic epidemiology. Both cross-sectional (between-subject) and longitudinal (within-subject) appro...
shorturl.at
July 8, 2025 at 12:47 PM
🚨New preprint is out!
How do genetic effects on complex traits change with age? In this work, we compare different approaches to obtain age-varying genetic effects, and show how design and modeling choices can impact the conclusions we draw.
shorturl.at/17snd
A thread 🧵👇
How do genetic effects on complex traits change with age? In this work, we compare different approaches to obtain age-varying genetic effects, and show how design and modeling choices can impact the conclusions we draw.
shorturl.at/17snd
A thread 🧵👇
Reposted by Isy Foote
ICYMI: New online! Translating lifestyle interventions for optimal brain health in Africa
Translating lifestyle interventions for optimal brain health in Africa
Nature Reviews Neurology, Published online: 11 July 2025; doi:10.1038/s41582-025-01104-8This Perspective article explores the efficacy of multimodal lifestyle interventions to tackle the rising incidence of dementia in low- and middle-income countries. The authors discuss a contextual adaptation of the Finnish FINGER trial, Africa-FINGERS, which is pioneering a culturally relevant, multidomain approach to dementia risk reduction for African settings.
bit.ly
July 13, 2025 at 4:02 AM
ICYMI: New online! Translating lifestyle interventions for optimal brain health in Africa
Reposted by Isy Foote
In a large-scale proteomic study of biological aging of 11 organs, the biological ages of the brain and immune system emerged as strong predictors of healthspan and longevity, according to a paper in Nature Medicine. go.nature.com/44nLb1M #medsky 🧪
July 13, 2025 at 7:28 PM
In a large-scale proteomic study of biological aging of 11 organs, the biological ages of the brain and immune system emerged as strong predictors of healthspan and longevity, according to a paper in Nature Medicine. go.nature.com/44nLb1M #medsky 🧪
Reposted by Isy Foote
Bell et al. report that multisite chronic pain, unlike single-site, in older adults is linked to faster cognitive decline and increased AD pathology, particularly in APOE-ɛ4 carriers. This supports multisite pain as a risk factor for AD dementia. Read at buff.ly/tXL0Qro
@TylerBellPhD
@TylerBellPhD
June 19, 2025 at 3:05 PM
Bell et al. report that multisite chronic pain, unlike single-site, in older adults is linked to faster cognitive decline and increased AD pathology, particularly in APOE-ɛ4 carriers. This supports multisite pain as a risk factor for AD dementia. Read at buff.ly/tXL0Qro
@TylerBellPhD
@TylerBellPhD
Reposted by Isy Foote
Preprint alert! 🚨
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Our manuscript on Exome sequencing and analysis of 44,028 British South Asians, using @genesandhealth.bsky.social is now available at @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social!
We present several great results, and I’m thrilled to highlight the pieces I worked on:
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Our manuscript on Exome sequencing and analysis of 44,028 British South Asians, using @genesandhealth.bsky.social is now available at @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social!
We present several great results, and I’m thrilled to highlight the pieces I worked on:
Exome sequencing and analysis of 44,028 British South Asians enriched for high autozygosity
Genes and Health (G&H) is a biomedical study of adult British-Pakistani and -Bangladeshi research volunteers enriched for autozygosity. We performed whole exome sequencing in 44,028 G&H participants, ...
doi.org
June 12, 2025 at 10:33 AM
Preprint alert! 🚨
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Our manuscript on Exome sequencing and analysis of 44,028 British South Asians, using @genesandhealth.bsky.social is now available at @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social!
We present several great results, and I’m thrilled to highlight the pieces I worked on:
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Our manuscript on Exome sequencing and analysis of 44,028 British South Asians, using @genesandhealth.bsky.social is now available at @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social!
We present several great results, and I’m thrilled to highlight the pieces I worked on:
Reposted by Isy Foote
📣📣 Preprint just out from the awesome Xilin Jiang, Yujie Zhao & co!
Pleiotropic heritability quantifies the shared genetic variance of common diseases www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
The overlap of disease aetiologies is surprisingly pervasive... ~50% of common disease heritability is pleiotropic!
Pleiotropic heritability quantifies the shared genetic variance of common diseases www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
The overlap of disease aetiologies is surprisingly pervasive... ~50% of common disease heritability is pleiotropic!
June 12, 2025 at 6:00 AM
📣📣 Preprint just out from the awesome Xilin Jiang, Yujie Zhao & co!
Pleiotropic heritability quantifies the shared genetic variance of common diseases www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
The overlap of disease aetiologies is surprisingly pervasive... ~50% of common disease heritability is pleiotropic!
Pleiotropic heritability quantifies the shared genetic variance of common diseases www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
The overlap of disease aetiologies is surprisingly pervasive... ~50% of common disease heritability is pleiotropic!
Reposted by Isy Foote
External link live! Please share widely :-)
WE ARE RECRUITING! 🥳
Are you an epidemiologist with strong quantitative skills and an interest in contributing to exciting research into the genetic architecture of vascular dementia? Come join our friendly and productive team at UCL!
shorturl.at/aZ5Ua
WE ARE RECRUITING! 🥳
Are you an epidemiologist with strong quantitative skills and an interest in contributing to exciting research into the genetic architecture of vascular dementia? Come join our friendly and productive team at UCL!
shorturl.at/aZ5Ua
June 11, 2025 at 8:51 AM
External link live! Please share widely :-)
WE ARE RECRUITING! 🥳
Are you an epidemiologist with strong quantitative skills and an interest in contributing to exciting research into the genetic architecture of vascular dementia? Come join our friendly and productive team at UCL!
shorturl.at/aZ5Ua
WE ARE RECRUITING! 🥳
Are you an epidemiologist with strong quantitative skills and an interest in contributing to exciting research into the genetic architecture of vascular dementia? Come join our friendly and productive team at UCL!
shorturl.at/aZ5Ua