Cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the leading cause of death worldwide and, despite continuous advances, better diagnostic and prognostic tools, as well as therapy, are needed. The human transcriptome, which is the set of all RNA produced in a cell, is much more complex than previously thought and the lack of dialogue between researchers and industrials and consensus on guidelines to generate data make it harder to compare and reproduce results. This European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) Action aims to accelerate the understanding of transcriptomics in CVD and further the translation of experimental data into usable applications to improve personalized medicine in this field by creating an interdisciplinary network. It aims to provide opportunities for collaboration between stakeholders from complementary backgrounds, allowing the functions of different RNAs and their interactions to be more rapidly deciphered in the cardiovascular context for translation into the clinic, thus fostering personalized medicine and meeting a current public health challenge. Thus, this Action will advance studies on cardiovascular transcriptomics, generate innovative projects, and consolidate the leadership of European research groups in the field.COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) is a funding organization for research and innovation networks (www.cost.eu).

Babes Bolyai University 400084 Cluj Napoca Romania

Biogazelle 9052 Zwijnaarde Belgium

Biomedical Research Foundation Academy of Athens 11527 Athens Greece

Cardiovascular Research Unit Luxembourg Institute of Health L 1445 Strassen Luxembourg

Center for Molecular Medicine Karolinska Institute 17176 Stockholm Sweden

Centre for Cardiovascular Science The Queen's Medical Research Institute University of Edinburgh EH16 4TJ Edinburgh UK

Department Cardiovascular Humanitas Research Hospital 20089 Rozzano Italy

Department of Basic Sciences University of Crete Medical School and Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Foundation for Research and Technology of Hellas Heraklion 71003 Crete Greece

Department of Biology Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics University of Tuzla 75000 Tuzla Bosnia and Herzegovina

Department of Biomedicine and Clinic of Cardiology University Hospital and University of Basel 4031 Basel Switzerland

Department of Cardiology Centre for Heart Failure Research Faculty of Health Medicine and Life Sciences Maastricht University 6229 ER Maastricht The Netherlands

Department of Cardiology Medical University of Vienna 1090 Vienna Austria

Department of Circulation and Medical Imaging Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences NTNU Norwegian University of Technology and Science NO 7489 Trondheim Norway

Department of Developmental Cardiology Institute of Physiology of the Czech Academy of Sciences 142 20 Prague Czech Republic

Department of Intelligent Systems Jozef Stefan Institute 1000e Ljubljana Slovenia

Department of Life and Health Sciences School of Sciences and Engineering University of Nicosia 2417 Nicosia Cyprus

Department of Medical Biology Faculty of Medicine Cumhuriyet University 58140 Sivas Turkey

Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy Semmelweis University 1085 Budapest Hungary

Department of Physiology Institute for Biological Research Siniša Stanković University of Belgrade 11000 Belgrade Serbia

Department of Physiology University of Valencia and INCLIVA Biomedical Research Institute INCLIVA 46010 Valencia Spain

Dokuz Eylul University Faculty of Medicine Department of Cardiology 35340 Izmir Turkey

Experimental Cardiology Unit Division of Cardiology Department of Cardiovascular Medicine University of Lausanne Medical School 1011 Lausanne Switzerland

Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences International University of Sarajevo 71210 Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina

Faculty of Health Sciences University of Malta MSD 2080 Msida Malta

Faculty of Technology and Metallurgy University of Belgrade 11000 Belgrade Serbia

Firalis 68330 Huningue France

INSERM Institut Pasteur de Lille 59019 Lille Cedex France

Institute for Drug Research Faculty of Medicine The Hebrew University 91120 Jerusalem Israel

Institute for Experimental Medical Research Oslo University Hospital and University of Oslo PB 4956 Nydalen NO 0424 Oslo Norway

Institute for Heart Research Centre of Experimental Medicine Slovak Academy of Sciences 84104 Bratislava Slovakia

Institute for Medical Informatics Statistics and Epidemiology IMISE Medical Faculty University of Leipzig 04107 Leipzig Germany

Institute of Biomedical Research of Barcelona 08036 Barcelona Spain

Institute of Cellular Biology and Pathology Nicolae Simionescu 050568 Bucharest Romania

Instituto de Medicina Molecular Faculty Medicine University Lisboa 1649 028 Lisboa Portugal

Integrated BioBank of Luxembourg L 3550 Dudelange Luxembourg

International Clinical Research Center 656 91 Brno Czech Republic

Mental Health Center Sct Hans 4000 Roskilde Denmark

Minerva Institute for Medical Research 00290 Helsinki Finland

Molecular Cardiology Laboratory IRCCS Policlinico San Donato 20097 San Donato Milanese Milan Italy

National Heart and Lung Institute Faculty of Medicine Imperial College London London W12 0HH UK

Regenerative Medicine Institute REMEDI National University of Ireland Galway H91 TK33 Galway Ireland

Research Unit of Biomedicine University of Oulu 90014 Oulu Finland

School for Cardiovascular Diseases Faculty Health Medicine and Life Sciences Maastricht University 6229ER Maastricht The Netherlands

TAmiRNA 1190 Vienna Austria

The Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski Institute of Cardiology 04 628 Warsaw Poland

University Hospital Centre Sisters of Charity Institute for clinical medical research and education 10 000 Zagreb Croatia

Westfälische Wilhelms Universität Münster Institute of Human Genetics Department of Genetic Epidemiology 48149 Münster Germany

See more in PubMed

Mendis S., Puska P., Norrving B., World Health Organization. World Heart Federation. World Stroke Organization . Global Atlas on Cardiovascular Disease Prevention and Control. World Health Organization in collaboration with the World Heart Federation and the World Stroke Organization; Geneva, Switzerland: 2011. p. vi.155p

Wilkins E., Wilson L., Wickramasinghe K., Bhatnagar P., Leal J., Luengo-Fernandez R., Burns R., Rayner M., Townsend N. European Cardiovascular Disease Statistics 2017. European Heart Network; Brussels, Belgium: European Society of Cardiology; Sophia Antipolis, France: 2017.

Medicine I.O. Promoting Cardiovascular Health in the Developing World: A Critical Challenge to Achieve Global Health. The National Academies Press; Washington, DC, USA: 2010. p. 482. PubMed DOI

Booth F.W., Gordon S.E., Carlson C.J., Hamilton M.T. Waging war on modern chronic diseases: Primary prevention through exercise biology. J. Appl. Physiol. 2000;88:774–787. doi: 10.1152/jappl.2000.88.2.774. PubMed DOI

Kearney P.M., Whelton M., Reynolds K., Muntner P., Whelton P.K., He J. Global burden of hypertension: Analysis of worldwide data. Lancet. 2005;365:217–223. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(05)70151-3. PubMed DOI

Jacquier A. The complex eukaryotic transcriptome: unexpected pervasive transcription and novel small RNAs. Nat. Rev. Genet. 2009;10:833–844. doi: 10.1038/nrg2683. PubMed DOI

Papageorgiou N., Tslamandris S., Giolis A., Tousoulis D. MicroRNAs in Cardiovascular Disease: Perspectives and Reality. Cardiol. Rev. 2016;24:110–118. doi: 10.1097/CRD.0000000000000078. PubMed DOI

Mitchell P.S., Parkin R.K., Kroh E.M., Fritz B.R., Wyman S.K., Pogosova-Agadjanyan E.L., Peterson A., Noteboom J., O’Briant K.C., Allen A., et al. Circulating microRNAs as stable blood-based markers for cancer detection. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 2008;105:10513–10518. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0804549105. PubMed DOI PMC

Arroyo J.D., Chevillet J.R., Kroh E.M., Ruf I.K., Pritchard C.C., Gibson D.F., Mitchell P.S., Bennett C.F., Pogosova-Agadjanyan E.L., Stirewalt D.L., et al. Argonaute2 complexes carry a population of circulating microRNAs independent of vesicles in human plasma. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 2011;108:5003–5008. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1019055108. PubMed DOI PMC

Weber J.A., Baxter D.H., Zhang S., Huang D.Y., Huang K.H., Lee M.J., Galas D.J., Wang K. The microRNA spectrum in 12 body fluids. Clin. Chem. 2010;56:1733–1741. doi: 10.1373/clinchem.2010.147405. PubMed DOI PMC

Cortez M.A., Bueso-Ramos C., Ferdin J., Lopez-Berestein G., Sood A.K., Calin G.A. MicroRNAs in body fluids—The mix of hormones and biomarkers. Nat. Rev. Clin. Oncol. 2011;8:467–477. doi: 10.1038/nrclinonc.2011.76. PubMed DOI PMC

Devaux Y. Transcriptome of blood cells as a reservoir of cardiovascular biomarkers. Biochim. Biophys. Acta Mol. Cell Res. 2017;1864:209–216. doi: 10.1016/j.bbamcr.2016.11.005. PubMed DOI

Goretti E., Wagner D.R., Devaux Y. miRNAs as biomarkers of myocardial infarction: A step forward towards personalized medicine? Trends Mol. Med. 2014;20:716–725. doi: 10.1016/j.molmed.2014.10.006. PubMed DOI

Antman E.M., Loscalzo J. Precision medicine in cardiology. Nat. Rev. Cardiol. 2016;13:591–602. doi: 10.1038/nrcardio.2016.101. PubMed DOI

Duffy D.J. Problems, challenges and promises: Perspectives on precision medicine. Brief. Bioinform. 2016;17:494–504. doi: 10.1093/bib/bbv060. PubMed DOI

Hall M.A., Moore J.H., Ritchie M.D. Embracing Complex Associations in Common Traits: Critical Considerations for Precision Medicine. Trends Genet. 2016;32:470–484. doi: 10.1016/j.tig.2016.06.001. PubMed DOI

Byron S.A., Van Keuren-Jensen K.R., Engelthaler D.M., Carpten J.D., Craig D.W. Translating RNA sequencing into clinical diagnostics: Opportunities and challenges. Nat. Rev. Genet. 2016;17:257–271. doi: 10.1038/nrg.2016.10. PubMed DOI PMC

Devaux Y., Zangrando J., Schroen B., Creemers E.E., Pedrazzini T., Chang C.P., Dorn G.W., 2nd, Thum T., Heymans S., Cardiolinc N. Long noncoding RNAs in cardiac development and ageing. Nat. Rev. Cardiol. 2015;12:415–425. doi: 10.1038/nrcardio.2015.55. PubMed DOI

Sullenger B.A., Nair S. From the RNA world to the clinic. Science. 2016;352:1417–1420. doi: 10.1126/science.aad8709. PubMed DOI PMC

Pedrotty D.M., Morley M.P., Cappola T.P. Transcriptomic biomarkers of cardiovascular disease. Prog. Cardiovasc. Dis. 2012;55:64–69. doi: 10.1016/j.pcad.2012.06.003. PubMed DOI PMC

Consortium E.P. An integrated encyclopedia of DNA elements in the human genome. Nature. 2012;489:57–74. doi: 10.1038/nature11247. PubMed DOI PMC

Filipowicz W., Bhattacharyya S.N., Sonenberg N. Mechanisms of post-transcriptional regulation by microRNAs: Are the answers in sight? Nat. Rev. Genet. 2008;9:102–114. doi: 10.1038/nrg2290. PubMed DOI

Friedman R.C., Farh K.K., Burge C.B., Bartel D.P. Most mammalian mRNAs are conserved targets of microRNAs. Genome Res. 2009;19:92–105. doi: 10.1101/gr.082701.108. PubMed DOI PMC

Lewis B.P., Burge C.B., Bartel D.P. Conserved Seed Pairing, Often Flanked by Adenosines, Indicates that Thousands of Human Genes are MicroRNA Targets. Cell. 2005;120:15–20. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2004.12.035. PubMed DOI

Boon R.A., Jae N., Holdt L., Dimmeler S. Long Noncoding RNAs: From Clinical Genetics to Therapeutic Targets? J. Am. Coll. Cardiol. 2016;67:1214–1226. doi: 10.1016/j.jacc.2015.12.051. PubMed DOI

Schnabel R.B., Baccarelli A., Lin H., Ellinor P.T., Benjamin E.J. Next steps in cardiovascular disease genomic research--sequencing, epigenetics, and transcriptomics. Clin. Chem. 2012;58:113–126. doi: 10.1373/clinchem.2011.170423. PubMed DOI PMC

Gurha P., Marian A.J. Noncoding RNAs in cardiovascular biology and disease. Circ. Res. 2013;113:e115–e120. doi: 10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.113.302988. PubMed DOI

Philippen L.E., Dirkx E., da Costa-Martins P.A., De Windt L.J. Non-coding RNA in control of gene regulatory programs in cardiac development and disease. J. Mol. Cell Cardiol. 2015;89:51–58. doi: 10.1016/j.yjmcc.2015.03.014. PubMed DOI

Ong S.B., Katwadi K., Kwek X.Y., Ismail N.I., Chinda K., Ong S.G., Hausenloy D.J. Non-coding RNAs as therapeutic targets for preventing myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury. Expert Opin. Therap. Targets. 2018;22:247–261. doi: 10.1080/14728222.2018.1439015. PubMed DOI

Ozsolak F., Milos P.M. RNA sequencing: advances, challenges and opportunities. Nat. Rev. Genet. 2011;12:87–98. doi: 10.1038/nrg2934. PubMed DOI PMC

Pritchard C.C., Cheng H.H., Tewari M. MicroRNA profiling: Approaches and considerations. Nat. Rev. Genet. 2012;13:358–369. doi: 10.1038/nrg3198. PubMed DOI PMC

Bustin S.A., Benes V., Garson J.A., Hellemans J., Huggett J., Kubista M., Mueller R., Nolan T., Pfaffl M.W., Shipley G.L., et al. The MIQE guidelines: Minimum information for publication of quantitative real-time PCR experiments. Clin. Chem. 2009;55:611–622. doi: 10.1373/clinchem.2008.112797. PubMed DOI

Wang K., Yuan Y., Cho J.H., McClarty S., Baxter D., Galas D.J. Comparing the MicroRNA spectrum between serum and plasma. PLoS ONE. 2012;7:e41561. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0041561. PubMed DOI PMC

Joining European Scientific Forces to Face Pandemics