Prof. Niedoszytko with a prestigious research grant

13.06.2019

Professor Marek Niedoszytko, pro-dean of the Faculty of Medicine and head of the Department of Allergology received a prestigious research grant from the Polpharma Scientific Foundation for the realization of the project entiled: “Studying the importance of epigenetic processes in the pathogenesis of mastocytosis in hope of finding new therapeutic options.”

Professor Niedoszytko’s project aims to answer the following questions:

1. Is there a relationship between epigenetic changes and disease symptoms in patients with mastocytosis. Are there epigenetic disease markers?
2. Is there a relationship between epigenetic changes and the response to the drugs used so far?
3. Is it possible to use drugs that affect epigenetic processes in the treatment of mastocytosis.

The answer to the first two questions will enable the research that will be carried out on patients with mastocytosis and further, allow to study epigenetic changes, the relationship with the response to drugs and possible epigenetic changes. Research on the cell lines will allow the evaluation of mast cell responses to compounds that are potential drugs affecting epigenetic processes.

It is predicted that the study will determine epigenetic changes in patients with mastocytosis in correlation with environmental factors such as: smoking, eating disorders, diet, allergy coexistence, exposure to polychlorinated biphenols, hormonal disorders. The results of these tests may allow the identification of epigenetic markers of the disease. Finally, the possibility of using drugs affecting epigenetic processes in the treatment of mastocytosis will be investigated.