Sonalee Laboratory Wish List 2019

The Sonalee Laboratory is sponsored by the Marfan Trust to undertake research in to Marfan syndrome. We urgently need your help to replace some of the laboratory equipment and buy new instruments to broaden our research. Our donation Wish List is below. 

We are happy to meet with you and chat about this list further, so please do get in touch. You can reach Dr. Aragon-Martin on 020 8725 1189 or by email at [email protected] 

If you would like to purchase or help towards a percentage of one of these items, please email the Marfan Trust [email protected] and find out the best way to do this. If you would like to visit the Sonalee Laboratory, meet the team and find out how your donation will help our research, please email us and we can arrange a time.

Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) screening; £1,000 for 1 sample. This will screen a patient’s DNA in the latest technology available: WGS (exons and introns). If you would like to purchase or help towards a percentage of one of these items, please email us and find out the best way to do this. If you would like to visit the Sonalee Laboratory, meet the team and find out how your donation will help our research, please email us and we can arrange a time. 

We will look for mutations in the FBN1 gene and other connective tissue disorder genes, and also use the data to help analyse possible modifier genes, which are genes with variants that might influence the severity of the different characteristics of Marfan syndrome patients. As a consequence, there will be fewer blood extractions and a possibility of saving money in lab. chemicals. The advantage of WGS over WES (whole exome sequencing) is that we will be able to analyse the introns (some variants found in introns have been described as causative mutation in Marfan syndrome). Introns are the “glue” that hold the genes together.

Conference:  American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) USA: 2 attendees @£2,500 per attendee, ideally. The money will go towards membership and conference fees, ESTA charges, flight, accommodation, food and transportation. It is very important for us to benefit from specialised networking, training and scientific talks, where the latest cutting edge technology will be demonstrated. Also presentations of Sonalee Laboratory research will be discussed with the scientific community. Presentations at the ASHG meeting and other published papers and presentations by the Sonalee Laboratory team can be found here.

Director of the Sonalee Laboratory for 1 year: £50,000 per year. To fund the Director of the Sonalee Laboratory so he can continue his research into Marfan syndrome.

PostDoc Studentship for 1 year: £40,000 per year. This will allow a student to continue their research into Marfan syndrome with us after obtaining their PhD in molecular genetics.

PhD studentship for 4 years: £100,000 [£25,000 per year]. This funding will allow a student to gain a PhD in molecular genetics in the Sonalee Laboratory while furthering research into Marfan syndrome.

Technician: £22,000 per year. This technician will help with the current workload in the Sonalee Laboratory and will be trained in the latest technology for mutation screening.

Summer studentship: £3,000 per student/per summer to host students who don’t have any means to support themselves when they come for Marfan syndrome laboratory training during the summer.