Costello, Joseph F PHD

Preeclampsia (PE) is a major cause of maternal and fetal, morbidity and mortality. Maternal deaths among PE and eclamptic patients can be as high as 1.8% in industrialized countries and 15% in the developing world. We will test the hypothesis that the placental epigenome and its relationship to the transcriptome hold the key to understanding the pathogenesis of sPE. The results could have significant translational potential in terms of generating novel therapeutic targets and biomarkers for predicting/diagnosing sPE using maternal blood.