Oxford: MitOX Conference 2020, online, 3-4th Dec 2020

Most talks aren't directly related to ME, but Karl Morten's talk is titled "Plasma Metabolomics in ME/CFS: a tale of two cohorts.".

Also possibly of interest is Bhupesh Prusty, whose talk is titled "Mitochondrial architecture decides the niche for pathogenic survival."

https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/news/mitox-2020-bookings-open

@wigglethemouse @FMMM1

 

Thanks for bringing this to my attention @Andy - I'll try to make a point to view it.

 

For anyone interested this is the thread for last years Mitox meeting.
https://www.s4me.info/threads/mitox...rchers-with-an-interest-in-mitochondria.8095/

And this is Andy's report from last years collaborators meeting held right after Mitox
https://www.s4me.info/threads/patie...l-mortens-collaborative-group-oxford-uk.9402/

That'll be interesting. I think he touched on that topic briefly in your Q&A if I remember right.

Cool. Glad the two of them will be in the same room! I'm guessing they must already have talked given the invitation.

Have you been invited to attend some of the 2020 meeting @Andy?

 

This meeting, to the best of my knowledge, won't be livestreamed or recorded, but I understand Karl will give this same talk at the CRMC conference next year, which will be.

I intend attending the whole day.

 

I'm looking forward to Karl Morten and Bhupesh Prusty meeting up - two out of box thinkers and both on the search for the "something in the blood".
https://twitter.com/user/status/1201438544671191040


Bhupesh Prusty is also collaborating with Robert Naviaux to look for the "fatigue factor" in the ME/CFS blood.
https://twitter.com/user/status/1207893534445056001


Now if only Paul Fisher could collaborate with them somehow to pool knowledge and advance the work faster......... Four brilliant minds looking at the Mitochondrial function of ME/CFS patients.

 

Could it be that the date of this conference has been changed? It now reads that "A two day virtual conference for researchers with an interest in mitochondria from academia and pharma, held on Thursday 3rd and Friday 4th December 2020."

Source: https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/mitox2020

 

Yes, I was sent an update, copied below, to that effect a couple of hours ago.

>>>>>

Dear All

We have decided to run this year’s MitOX event as an online meeting over the 3rd and 4th Dec.

The current programme can be found at https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/mitox2020. This includes the speakers selected from the abstracts back in March 2020. Timings are shown on the attached draft plan [not attached, see https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/mitox2020].

We cannot unfortunately accommodate new abstracts but new delegates are welcome to register so please pass the word. All previous registrations are still valid.

To register go to https://www.oxforduniversitystores....reproductive-health/events/mitox-meeting-2020

For previously submitted abstracts we plan to run a flash presentation session during the lunch session at the end of each day. These will be 3 slides max, lasting 3 min’s. If you have submitted an abstract and would like to give a flash presentation please E-mail Prof Jo Poulton (ccd in) who will be organising the session.

A couple of points

1) The meeting will now be free to attend, all registration fees will be refunded.

2) Previous registrations are still valid, so no need to register again.

3) As numbers will be limited (250 max on Teams) if you find you no longer able to attend please let me know.

4) Registration to attend is now open again and will remain open until the 29th November


Best wishes

Karl, Lisa and Jo

 

From Karl Morten.

"Do you think any of the S4ME people would like to attend the mito medicine session at MitOX on the 4th. Programme attached. We could probably cope with another 30-40.

I just need email addresses. Best if they come in one document. I will then send them the meeting link.

They can just dial in for the talks they want to attend."


So from the programme, this is the section that Karl is talking about.

Mitochondrial medicine

Chair: Jo Elson (Newcastle)

11.20 James McCullagh (Oxford) IDH mutations in cancer

11.45 Karl Morten (Oxford) Plasma Metabolomics in ME/CFS and the impact of a structured exercise programme.

12.10 Bhupesh Prusty (Wurzberg) Mitochondrial architecture decides the niche for pathogenic survival.

12.35 Joerg Burgstaller ( to be confirmed)

12.55 Session questions

If you are interested in receiving the meeting link, send me an email at andy@s4me.info, before midday 1st December, and I'll gather them up and pass them to Karl.

 

Thanks for the offer @Andy . Very very kind of Karl Morten to extend this invitation. Unfortunately for me the time difference doesn't work, but hopefully some others can attend, as this would show the researchers that we are very interested in the Science!

 

I really enjoyed the two talks today. Bhupesh's work on what happens when cells are infected by both a bacterium and HHV6 might have some fascinating implications, though it sounds as if there's a way to go before any role in disease is fully understood.

What immediately stood out from Karl's talk – which was done at some speed because wanted to cover so much ground! – was the slide showing that in people with ME who manage to exercise, metabolite profiles become less like those of healthy controls, not more like them. Which suggests there's no recovery process taking place, it might just be that some patients are capable of additional metabolic adaptation.

He also made an important point about the fact that the metabolites that distinguish patients from healthy controls are all unknown. It's an interesting thought that there could feasibly be a test that's reliable enough to be useful, even though no-one yet knows the functions of the molecules it's measuring.

 

I didn't attend this talk so don't know if this is new work, or the same as he reported on two years ago in New Zealand. There was also a separate ME Association report on the metabolite work I think.

That NZ talk is here
https://www.s4me.info/threads/quest...-of-oxford-sept-2019.10827/page-2#post-195896

We presented questions in the s4me Q&A with Karl Morten such as this one

At the end of the day I'm guessing without funding it is really difficult to follow up on. There is also the issue with sample collection and preparation procedures as those can have a huge difference on measuring metabolites, so reproducability may be hard without having your own cohort and rapid sample preparation.

 

This is a paper that is the basis for one of the other talks at the virtual conference, which the topic was familiar to me:

"Neuropilin-1 Controls Endothelial Homeostasis by Regulating Mitochondrial Function and Iron-Dependent Oxidative Stress"
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004218302347

Notably, SARS-CoV2 and EBV both utilise NRP1 as a cell-entry factor in endothelial cells...

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/1335161926888923136


https://twitter.com/user/status/1335162393383620609


https://twitter.com/user/status/1335163146575736832