Research Outputs

Artur Miralles Meharon, from our 2024 cohort, was a co-author on a high impact paper “Replicated blood-based biomarkers for myalgic encephalomyelitis not explicable by inactivity”, published in June 2025. 

Beentjes, S. V., Miralles Méharon, A., Kaczmarczyk, J., Cassar, A., Samms, G. L., Hejazi, N. S., Khamseh, A., & Ponting, C. P. (2025). Replicated blood-based biomarkers for myalgic encephalomyelitis not explicable by inactivity. EMBO Molecular Medicine, 17(7), 1868–1891. 

https://doi.org/10.1038/s44321-025-00258-8

It concerns the largest ever biological study of ME/CFS (myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome) that has identified consistent blood differences associated with chronic inflammation, insulin resistance and liver disease. 

Significantly, the results were mostly unaffected by patients’ activity levels, as low activity levels can sometimes hide the biological signs of illness, researchers say. 

The volume and consistency of the blood differences support the long-term goal of developing a blood test to help diagnose ME/CFS. ME/CFS’ key feature, called post-exertional malaise, is a delayed dramatic worsening of symptoms following minor physical effort.  

Other symptoms include pain, brain fog and extreme energy limitation that does not improve with rest. Causes are unknown and there is currently no diagnostic test or cure. 

Researchers at the Institute of Genetics and Cancer worked with colleagues in the University of Edinburgh’s Schools of Mathematics and Informatics to better understand the biology that underpins the condition. 

They used data from the UK Biobank – a health database of over half a million people – to compare 1,455 ME/CFS patients with 131,000 healthy individuals. They examined more than 3,000 blood-based biomarkers and used advanced models to account for differences associated with age, sex, and activity levels.  

The results, which were replicated afterwards using data from the US, showed that hundreds of biomarkers differed between ME/CFS patients and healthy people.  

Some 116 significant differences were found in both men and women, a key finding as ME/CFS can affect sexes differently. The consistent results across both groups strengthens the reliability of the biomarkers.  The strongest biomarker differences were found in people who reported symptoms consistent with post-exertional malaise, highlighting its central role in the illness.  

Researchers believe these biomarker changes are more likely a result of ME/CFS, rather than the initial trigger of the illness.

University of Edinburgh researchers were supported by partners from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

• BBC news story

In June 2025, our students Elisa Castagnari and Núria Fàbrega Ribas had a fantastic experience representing AI4BI at HealTAC2025 in Glasgow. 

For Elisa, it was a milestone — her first poster presentation, accompanied by a lightning talk, both of which sparked insightful discussions around her research on improving digital healthcare solutions with data interoperability and LLMs.

In July 2025, our student Zhijie Yao attended the ISMB/ECCB 2025 conference in Liverpool, jointly organised by the International Society for Computational Biology and ECCB, recognised as the world’s largest conference in bioinformatics and computational biology.

Zhijie presented his very first academic poster, co-authored with Ava Khamseh and Sjoerd Beentjes, showcasing their research using a debiased statistical estimation method to extract valuable insights from high‑dimensional datasets.