Gagandeep Kaur Walia is a Biological Anthropologist by training and is working in the area of Genetic Epidemiology in Centre for Chronic Conditions and Injuries. She is skilled in genetic and epigenetic techniques and thus contributing in the area of genetic and epigenetic epidemiology in various grants. Her research interests include genetic and epigenetic determinants of cardio-metabolic traits and utilizing genetic information in examining causal inferences (Mendelian Randomization). She is interested in studying the genetic and epigenetic variants and their interaction with modifiable lifestyle and environmental risk factors to understand the etiology of chronic diseases, specifically cardiometabolic and respiratory disorders. She also manages the genetics laboratory of PHFI which handles DNA isolation from various biological sources, sample preparation for high throughput genotyping and epityping, systematic storage and bio-repository for different large scale projects.
Recently she has been contributing in the Center for Environmental Health at PHFI and is involved with grants focused on air pollution and cardiometabolic health. Her research areas include indoor air pollution in environmental health and the utility of genetic and epigenetic mechanisms influencing air pollution and chronic conditions.
Currently, she has been awarded Wellcome Trust/DBT India Alliance early career fellowship to examine causal relationship between regional body fat distribution and lipid levels in Indian population using bi-directional mendelian randomization approach. The genome-wide resource that would be generated through this fellowship will address multiple research questions and will ensure long term research activities in genetic epidemiology of cardiometabolic traits.
- PHFI
- CCCI
- CCCC
- CEH
Her research interests include genetic and epigenetic epidemiology of chronic disorders, specifically cardiometabolic and respiratory disorders. She is also involved in environmental health group where she is particularly interested to examine gene-environment interactions and epigenetics as possible mediating factor between environmental exposures and health outcomes. Currently, she has been awarded WT/DBT early career fellowship grant to examine causal relationship between body fat distribution and lipid levels using bi-directional Mendelian Randomization approach.
- Non-Communicable Diseases(NCDs) and Injuries
- Environmental Health
- Human Genetics
- PHFI Lab