The application of computational methods to heart research and its associated renal and metabolic systems poses a unique set of challenges and opportunities for biomedical innovation. With the rise of large-scale databases and advanced computing to support healthcare and biotechnology initiatives that accelerate drug discovery and development of therapeutics, investigators with the Krannert Cardiovascular Research Center at Indiana University School of Medicine anticipate cardioinformatics advancements will help inform clinical practice and transform public health within the cardiovascular space.
Cardioinformatics is an interdisciplinary field that applies bioinformatics and computational biology approaches to cardio-(vascular/renal/metabolic) disease data storage, computing and analysis. Formally defined as the nexus of bioinformatics and precision cardiology, cardioinformatics focuses on heart and vascular system research and provides a constellation of data that can inform researchers on both a broad and granular level on intersecting subspecialties related to the cardiovascular system, including endocrinology, nephrology and metabolism.
Bohdan Khomtchouk, PhD, a primary investigator with IU Krannert, is a human geneticist and pioneer in the interdisciplinary field of cardioinformatics, who leads the Cardioinformatics Research Program. Khomtchouk brings a critical skillset to cardiovascular research. His team works toward integrating computational biology and AI/machine learning-based approaches to decipher cardiovascular genomics that will facilitate novel drug target discovery and drug repurposing strategies to treat heart disease. These areas include renal and metabolic co-morbidities, with a focus on addressing genomic health disparities and building new biological databases and biobanks for historically underrepresented populations.
