Honorary Research Fellow
MB BS, FRACP (paeds), PhD, DCH
A/Professor Huang (MBBS, FRACP, PhD, DCH) is a paediatric physician and leading clinical researcher in early antecedents of cardiometabolic disease. Her work investigates pathogenesis of cardiovascular and related metabolic disease, with emphasis on their origins in pregnancy and early childhood. She completed her PhD in 2010, investigating the role of early life precursors on adolescent cardio-metabolic risk. She holds an associate professorship at Telethon Kids Institute/UWA. She currently leads the Australian arm of the EU “Early-life stressors and LifeCycle health” and led the NHMRC project "A two generation population study of obesity epigenetics".
Dr Huang's research focuses on understanding the early origins of human disease particularly in reference to obesity and related cardiovascular risk factors. A/Professor Huang has had continuous financial support in the role of chief investigator from the NHMRC since 2011 amounting to over $3.5 million to date and is supported by a NHMRC fellowship. She has worked as a paediatric consultant in the paediatric obesity clinic in the department of Endocrinology at Princess Margaret Hospital, now Perth Children’s hospital since 2010.
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Publications
February 2024
Developmental origins of psycho-cardiometabolic multimorbidity in adolescence and their underlying pathways through methylation markers: a two-cohort study
Understanding the biological mechanisms behind multimorbidity patterns in adolescence is important as they may act as intermediary risk factor for long-term health. We aimed to explore relationship between prenatal exposures and adolescent's psycho-cardiometabolic intermediary traits mediated through epigenetic biomarkers, using structural equation modeling (SEM).
Published research Diabetes and Obesity Youth Mental HealthDecember 2023Maternal educational attainment in pregnancy and epigenome-wide DNA methylation changes in the offspring from birth until adolescence
Maternal educational attainment (MEA) shapes offspring health through multiple potential pathways. Differential DNA methylation may provide a mechanistic understanding of these long-term associations. We aimed to quantify the associations of MEA with offspring DNA methylation levels at birth, in childhood and in adolescence.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and ObesityJun 2023Measures of Early-life Behavior and Later Psychopathology in the LifeCycle Project-EU Child Cohort Network: A Cohort Description
The EU LifeCycle Project was launched in 2017 to combine, harmonize, and analyze data from more than 250,000 participants across Europe and Australia, involving cohorts participating in the EU-funded LifeCycle Project. The purpose of this cohort description is to provide a detailed overview of the major measures within mental health domains that are available in 17 European and Australian cohorts participating in the LifeCycle Project.
Published research Diabetes and Obesity Youth Mental Health Subsite: DiabetesMarch 2023Differences in birth weight between immigrants' and natives' children in Europe and Australia: a LifeCycle comparative observational cohort study
Research on adults has identified an immigrant health advantage, known as the 'immigrant health paradox', by which migrants exhibit better health outcomes than natives. Is this health advantage transferred from parents to children in the form of higher birth weight relative to children of natives?
Published research Diabetes and ObesityFebruary 2023Differential DNA methylation of steatosis and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in adolescence
Epigenetic modifications are associated with hepatic fat accumulation and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). However, few epigenetic modifications directly implicated in such processes have been identified during adolescence, a critical developmental window where physiological changes could influence future disease trajectory. To investigate the association between DNA methylation and NAFLD in adolescence, we undertook discovery and validation of novel methylation marks, alongside replication of previously reported marks.
Published research Academic Biostatistics Diabetes and ObesityJanuary 2023Gestational age at birth and body size from infancy through adolescence: An individual participant data meta-analysis on 253,810 singletons in 16 birth cohort studies
Preterm birth is the leading cause of perinatal morbidity and mortality and is associated with adverse developmental and long-term health outcomes, including several cardiometabolic risk factors and outcomes. However, evidence about the association of preterm birth with later body size derives mainly from studies using birth weight as a proxy of prematurity rather than an actual length of gestation. We investigated the association of gestational age (GA) at birth with body size from infancy through adolescence.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and Obesity Pre-term birthNovember 2022Associations between Prenatal Exposure to Phthalates and Features of the Metabolic Syndrome in Males from Childhood into Adulthood
Phthalate metabolites are detectable within the majority of the population. Evidence suggests that a prenatal exposure to phthalates may be associated with the subsequent risks of obesity and elevated blood pressure. We hypothesised that a prenatal exposure to phthalates would lead to an increase in adverse cardiometabolic parameters through childhood and adulthood.
Diabetes (Type 1) Published research Diabetes and Obesity Raine studyNovember 2021Cohort description: Measures of early-life behaviour and later psychopathology in the LifeCycle Project - EU Child Cohort Network
The EU LifeCycle Project was launched in 2017 to combine, harmonise, and analyse data from more than 250,000 participants across Europe and Australia, involving cohorts participating in the EU-funded LifeCycle Project. The purpose of this cohort description is to provide a detailed overview over the major measures within mental health domains that are available in 17 European and Australian cohorts participating in the LifeCycle Project.
Published research Diabetes and Obesity Youth Mental Health Youth mental healthFebruary 2022Associations of early-life pet ownership with asthma and allergic sensitization: A meta-analysis of more than 77,000 children from the EU Child Cohort Network
Studies examining associations of early-life cat and dog ownership with childhood asthma have reported inconsistent results. Several factors could explain these inconsistencies, including type of pet, timing, and degree of exposure. Our aim was to study associations of early-life cat and dog ownership with asthma in school-aged children, including the role of type (cat vs dog), timing (never, prenatal, or early childhood), and degree of ownership (number of pets owned), and the role of allergic sensitization.
Asthma Published research Diabetes and Obesity Children's Lung Health AllergyMarch 2022The relationship between intrauterine foetal growth trajectories and blood pressure in young adults
Previous studies have reported an association between low birthweight and elevated blood pressure (BP) in adulthood, but few have examined the relationship between foetal growth and adult BP.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and Obesity Pre-term birthOctober 2021Identifying young adults at high risk of cardiometabolic disease using cluster analysis and the Framingham 30-yr risk score
Current strategies to reduce cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in young adults are largely limited to those at extremes of risk. In cohort studies we have shown cluster analysis identified a large sub-group of adolescents with multiple risk factors.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and ObesityJune 2021DNA methylation patterns within whole blood of adolescents born from assisted reproductive technology are not different from adolescents born from natural conception
Study question: Do the epigenome-wide DNA methylation profiles of adolescents born from ART differ from the epigenome of naturally conceived counterparts? Summary answer: No significant differences in the DNA methylation profiles of adolescents born from ART [IVF or ICSI] were observed when compared to their naturally conceived, similar aged counterparts.
Published research Diabetes and ObesityApril 2021Epigenome-Wide Association Study of Thyroid Function Traits Identifies Novel Associations of fT3 With KLF9 and DOT1L
The aim is to identify novel associations between fT3, fT4, and TSH and differentially methylated positions (DMPs) in the genome in subjects from 2 Australian cohorts. We performed an epigenome-wide association study (EWAS) of thyroid function parameters and DNAm using participants from Brisbane Systems Genetics Study and the Raine Study.
Published research Diabetes and ObesityApril 2021The EU Child Cohort Network’s core data: establishing a set of findable, accessible, interoperable and re-usable (FAIR) variables
The Horizon2020 LifeCycle Project is a cross-cohort collaboration which brings together data from multiple birth cohorts from across Europe and Australia to facilitate studies on the influence of early-life exposures on later health outcomes. A major product of this collaboration has been the establishment of a FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable) data resource known as the EU Child Cohort Network. Here we focus on the EU Child Cohort Network's core variables.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and Obesity Children's Lung HealthFebruary 2021Adiposity associated DNA methylation signatures in adolescents are related to leptin and perinatal factors
Epigenetics links perinatal influences with later obesity. We identifed differentially methylated CpG (dmCpG) loci measured at 17 years associated with concurrent adiposity measures and examined whether these were associated with hsCRP, adipokines, and early life environmental factors. Genome-wide DNA methylation from 1192 Raine Study participants at 17 years, identified 29 dmCpGs associated with body mass index, 10 with waist circumference and 9 with subcutaneous fat thickness.
Published research Youth Health Diabetes and Obesity Computational BiologyNovember 2020DNA methylation and body mass index from birth to adolescence: meta-analyses of epigenome-wide association studies
DNA methylation has been shown to be associated with adiposity in adulthood. However, whether similar DNA methylation patterns are associated with childhood and adolescent body mass index (BMI) is largely unknown. More insight into this relationship at younger ages may have implications for future prevention of obesity and its related traits. We examined whether DNA methylation in cord blood and whole blood in childhood and adolescence was associated with BMI in the age range from 2 to 18 years using both cross-sectional and longitudinal models.
Published research Early Childhood Development Diabetes and ObesityMay 2020ApoB48-Lipoproteins Are Associated with Cardiometabolic Risk in Adolescents
Adolescents with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) have increased incidence of cardiometabolic risk factors including dyslipidemia. Atherogenic apolipoprotein (apo) B-lipoprotein remnants are associated with increased cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk.
Published research Diabetes and ObesitySeptember 2020Machine Learning-Based DNA Methylation Score for Fetal Exposure to Maternal Smoking
Fetal exposure to maternal smoking during pregnancy is associated with the development of noncommunicable diseases in the offspring. Maternal smoking may induce such long-term effects through persistent changes in the DNA methylome, which therefore hold the potential to be used as a biomarker of this early life exposure. With declining costs for measuring DNA methylation, we aimed to develop a DNA methylation score that can be used on adolescent DNA methylation data and thereby generate a score for in utero cigarette smoke exposure.
Published research Diabetes and ObesitySeptember 2020Methylome-wide association study of central adiposity implicates genes involved in immune and endocrine systems
We conducted a methylome-wide association study to examine associations between DNA methylation in whole blood and central adiposity and body fat distribution, measured as waist circumference, waist-to-hip ratio and waist-to-height ratio adjusted for body mass index, in 2684 African-American adults in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study.
Published research Diabetes and Obesity -
Education and Qualifications
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Awards/Honours
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Active Collaborations