Professor Emma Meaburn
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Overview
Overview
Web profiles
Administrative responsibilities
- Co-Convenor MSc Psychology Conversion course
- Co-Director Genes, Environment, Lifespan laboratory
ORCID
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Research
Research
Research overview
Dr Meaburn’s research program is centered on the fundamental, yet timely, question of how genetic variation contributes to individual differences in behavior and how these causal processes unfold across development. Her research harnesses contemporary molecular genomic and statistical genetic approaches using clinical, twin, familial and population-based samples. Key insights from her research include that variance in learning abilities is polygenic, and the development of early versions of polygenic scores with applications in prediction. Her research has over time expanded to address the developmental timing and specificity of genetic and epigenetic effects, and the role of environmental factors. This multidisciplinary work has real-world implications for educational practice and social policies, and for the treatment and early identification of neurodevelopmental disorders.
An up-to-date summary of research activities can be found here
Research Centres and Institutes
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Supervision and teaching
Supervision and teaching
Supervision
I supervise empirical research projects for the BSc Psychology, MSc Psychology and MSc Specialist course students.
Teaching
Teaching modules
- Evolution and Genetics
- Critical Review of Research Methodologies in Psychological and Clinical Sciences
- Dissertation MRes Psychology
- Behavioural Neuroscience
- Generic Research Skills
- Academic Skills for PG Students
- Genetics of Development
- Research Ethics
- Neuroscience
- Introduction to Research Methods
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Publications
Publications
Article
- Gui, Anna and Meaburn, Emma and Tye, C. and Charman, T. and Johnson, Mark H. and Jones, Emily J.H. (2021) Association of Polygenic Liability for Autism with face-sensitive cortical responses from infancy. JAMA Pediatrics 175 (9), pp. 968-970. ISSN 2168-6203.
- Fish, L. and Nystrom, P. and Gliga, Teodora and Gui, Anna and Begum Ali, Jannath and Mason, Luke and Garg, S. and Green, J. and Johnson, Mark H. and Charman, T. and Harrison, Rebecca and Meaburn, Emma and Falck-Ytter, T. and Jones, Emily J.H. (2021) Development of the pupillary light reflex from 9 to 24 months: association with common ASD genetic liability and 3-year ASD diagnosis. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 62 (11), pp. 1308-1319. ISSN 0021-9630.
- Donati, Georgina and Dumontheil, Iroise and Pain, O. and Asbury, K. and Meaburn, Emma (2021) Evidence for specificity of polygenic contributions to attainment in English, maths and science during adolescence. Scientific Reports 11 (3851), ISSN 2045-2322.
- Donati, Georgina and Meaburn, Emma and Dumontheil, Iroise (2021) Internalising and externalising in early adolescence predict later executive function, not the other way around: a cross-lagged panel analysis. Cognition and Emotion 35 (5), pp. 986-998. ISSN 0269-9931.
- Fish, Laurel and Nyström, P. and Gliga, Teodora and Gui, Anna and Begum Ali, Jannath and Mason, Luke and Garg, S. and Green, Jonathan and Johnson, Mark H. and Charman, T. and Harrison, Rebecca and Meaburn, Emma and Falck-Ytter, t. and Jones, Emily J.H. (2021) Development of the pupillary light reflex from 9- to 24-months in infants with elevated familial and genetic liability to autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 62 (11), ISSN 0021-9630.
- Gui, Anna and Jones, Emily J.H. and Wong, C. and Meaburn, Emma and Baocong, X. and Pasco, G. and Lloyd-Fox, Sarah and Charman, T. and Bolton, P. and Johnson, Mark H. (2020) Leveraging epigenetics to examine differences in developmental trajectories of social attention: a proof-of-principle study of DNA methylation in infants with older siblings with autism. Infant Behavior and Development 60 (101409), ISSN 0163-6383.
- Donati, Georgina and Dumontheil, Iroise and Meaburn, Emma (2019) Genome-wide association study of latent cognitive measures in adolescence: genetic overlap with intelligence and education. Mind, Brain, and Education 13 (3), pp. 224-233. ISSN 1751-2271.
- Saffari, Ayden and Arno, M. and Nasser, E. and Ronald, Angelica and Wong, C.C.Y. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Mill, J. and Dudbridge, F. and Meaburn, Emma (2019) RNA sequencing of identical twins discordant for autism reveals blood-based signatures implicating immune and transcriptional dysregulation. Molecular Autism 10, pp. 38. ISSN 2040-2392.
- Saffari, Ayden and Silver, M.J. and Zavattari, P. and Moi, L. and Columbano, A. and Meaburn, Emma and Dudbridge, F. (2018) Estimation of a significance threshold for epigenome-wide association studies. Genetic Epidemiology 42 (1), pp. 20-33. ISSN 1098-2272.
- Donati, Georgina and Meaburn, Emma and Dumontheil, Iroise (2018) The specificity of associations between cognition and attainment in English, maths and science during adolescence. Learning and Individual Differences 69, pp. 84-93. ISSN 1041-6080.
- Marzi, S. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Dempster, E.L. and Lunnon, K. and Paya-Cano, J. and Smith, R. and Volta, M. and Troakes, C. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Mill, J. (2016) Tissue-specific patterns of allelically-skewed DNA methylation. Epigenetics 11 (1), pp. 24-35. ISSN 1559-2294.
- Thomas, Michael S.C. and Kovas, Y. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Tolmie, A. (2015) What can the study of genetics offer to educators?. Mind Brain & Education 9 (2), pp. 72-80. ISSN 1751-228X.
- Spain, S.L. and Pedroso, I. and Kadeva, N. and Miller, M.B. and Iacono, W.G. and McGue, M. and Stergiakouli, E. and Smith, G.D. and Putallaz, M. and Lubinski, D. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Plomin, R. and Simpson, M.A. (2015) A genome-wide analysis of putative functional and exonic variation associated with extremely high intelligence. Molecular Psychiatry 21, pp. 1145-1151. ISSN 1359-4184.
- Wong, C.C.Y. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Ronald, Angelica and Price, T.S and Jeffries, A.R. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Plomin, R. and Mill, J. (2014) Methylomic analysis of monozygotic twins discordant for autism spectrum disorder and related behavioural traits. Molecular Psychiatry 19 (4), pp. 495-503. ISSN 1359-4184.
- Benyamin, B. and St. Pourcain, B. and Davis, O.S.P. and Davies, G. and Hansell, N.K. and Brion, M.-Ja and Kirkpatrick, R.M. and Cents, R.A.M. and Franić, S. and Miller, M.B. and Haworth, C. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Price, T.S and Evans, D.M. and Timpson, N. and Kemp, J. and Ring, S. and McArdle, W. and Medland, S.E. and Yang, J. and Harris, S.E. and Liewald, D.C. and Scheet, P. and Xiao, X. and Hudziak, J.J. and de Geus, E.J.C. and Jaddoe, V.W.V. and Starr, J.M. and Verhulst, F.C. and Pennell, C.E. and Tiemeier, H. and Iacono, W.G. and Palmer, L.J. and Montgomery, G.W. and Martin, N.G. and Boomsma, D.I. and Posthuma, D. and McGue, M. and Wright, M.J. and Davey Smith, G. and Deary, I.J. and Plomin, R. and Visscher, P.M. (2014) Childhood intelligence is heritable, highly polygenic and associated with FNBP1L. Molecular Psychiatry 19, pp. 253-258. ISSN 1359-4184.
- Sieradzka, D. and Power, R.A. and Freedman, D. and Cardno, A.G. and McGuire, P. and Plomin, R. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Ronald, Angelica (2014) Are genetic risk factors for psychosis also associated with dimension-specific psychotic experiences in adolescence?. PLoS One ISSN 1932-6203.
- Davis, O.S.P. and Band, G. and Pirinen, M. and Haworth, C.M.A. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Kovas, Y. and Harlaar, N. and Docherty, S.J. and Hanscombe, K.B. and Trzaskowski, M. and Curtis, C.J.C. and Strange, A. and Freeman, C. and Bellenguez, C. and Su, Z. and Pearson, R. and Vukcevic, D. and Langford, C. and Deloukas, P. and Hunt, S. and Gray, E. and Dronov, S. and Potter, S.C. and Tashakkori-Ghanbaria, A. and Edkins, S. and Bumpstead, S.J. and Blackwell, J.M. and Bramon, E. and Brown, M.A. and Casas, J.P. and Corvin, A. and Duncanson, A. and Jankowski, J.A.Z. and Markus, H.S. and Mathew, C.G. and Palmer, C.N.A. and Rautanen, A. and Sawcer, S.J. and Trembath, R.C. and Viswanathan, A.C. and Wood, N.W. and Barroso, I. and Peltonen, L. and Dale, P.S. and Petrill, S.A. and Schalkwyk, L.S. and Craig, I.W. and Lewis, C.M. and Price, T.S. and Donnelly, P. and Plomin, R. and Spencer, C.C.A. (2014) The correlation between reading and mathematics ability at age twelve has a substantial genetic component. Nature Communications 5, pp. 4204. ISSN 2041-1723.
- Broadbent, H. and Farran, E.K. and Chin, E. and Metcalfe, K. and Tassabehji, M. and Turnpenny, P. and Sansbury, F. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Karmiloff-Smith, Annette (2014) Genetic contributions to visuospatial cognition in Williams syndrome: insights from two contrasting partial deletion patients. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders 6 (1), pp. 18. ISSN 1866-1955.
- St Pourcain, B. and Cents, R.A.M. and Whitehouse, A.J.O. and Haworth, C.M.A. and Davis, O.S.P. and O’Reilly, P.F. and Roulstone, S. and Wren, Y. and Ang, Q.W. and Velders, F.P. and Evans, D.M. and Kemp, John P. and Warrington, N.M. and Miller, L. and Timpson, N.J. and Ring, S.M. and Verhulst, F.C. and Hofman, A. and Rivadeneira, F. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Price, T.S. and Dale, P.S. and Pillas, D. and Yliherva, A. and Rodriguez, A. and Golding, J. and Jaddoe, V.W.V. and Jarvelin, M.-R. and Plomin, R. and Pennell, C.E. and Tiemeier, H. and Davey Smith, G. (2014) Common variation near ROBO2 is associated with expressive vocabulary in infancy. Nature Communications 5, pp. 4831. ISSN 2041-1723.
- St Pourcain, B. and Haworth, C.M.A. and Davis, O.S.P. and Wang, K. and Timpson, N.J. and Evans, D.M. and Kemp, John P. and Ronald, Angelica and Price, T.S and Meaburn, Emma L. and Ring, S.M. and Golding, J. and Hakonarson, H. and Plomin, R. and Davey Smith, G. (2014) Heritability and genome‐wide analyses of problematic peer relationships during childhood and adolescence. Human Genetics 134 (6), pp. 539-551. ISSN 0340-6717.
- Harlaar, N. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Hayiou-Thomas, M.E. and Davis, O.S.P. and Docherty, S.J. and Hanscombe, K.B. and Haworth, C. and Price, T.S and Trzaskowski, M. and Dale, P. and Plomin, R. (2013) Genome-wide association study of receptive language ability of 12 year olds. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research ISSN 1092-4388.
- Viding, E. and Price, T.S and Jaffee, S.R. and Trzaskowski, M. and Davis, O.S.P. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Haworth, C. and Plomin, R. (2013) Genetics of callous-unemotional behavior in children. PLoS One 8 (7), pp. e65789. ISSN 1932-6203.
- Plomin, R. and Haworth, C. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Price, T.S and Davis, O.S.P. (2013) Common DNA markers can account for more than half of the genetic influence on cognitive abilities. Psychological Science 24 (4), pp. 562-568. ISSN 0956-7976.
- Trzaskowski, M. and Eley, T.C. and Davis, O.S.P. and Doherty, S.J. and Hanscombe, K.B. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Haworth, C. and Price, T.S and Plomin, R. (2013) First genome-wide association study on anxiety-related behaviours in childhood. PLoS One 8 (4), pp. e58676. ISSN 1932-6203.
- Meaburn, Emma L. and Schulz, R. (2012) Next generation sequencing in epigenetics: insights and challenges. Seminars in Cell & Developmental Biology 23 (2), pp. 192-9. ISSN 1084-9521.
- Schosser, A. and Pirlo, K. and Gaysina, D. and Cohen-Woods, S. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Elkin, A. and Korszun, A. and Gunasinghe, C. and Gray, J. and Jones, L. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Farmer, A.E. and Craig, I.W. and McGuffin, P. (2010) Utility of the pooling approach as applied to whole genome association scans with high-density Affymetrix microarrays.. BMC Research Notes 3, pp. 274-279. ISSN 1756-0500.
- Davies, M.N. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Schalkwyk, L.C. (2010) Gene set enrichment; a problem of pathways. Briefings in Functional Genomics 9 (5-6), pp. 385-90. ISSN 2041-2649.
- Meaburn, Emma L. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Mill, J. (2010) Allele-specific methylation in the human genome: implications for genetic studies of complex disease. Epigenetics 5 (7), pp. 578-582. ISSN 1559-2294.
- Schalkwyk, L.C. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Smith, R. and Dempster, E.L. and Jeffries, A.R. and Davies, M.N. and Plomin, R. and Mill, J. (2010) Allelic skewing of DNA methylation is widespread across the genome. The American Journal of Human Genetics 86 (2), pp. 196-212. ISSN 0002-9297.
- Viding, E. and Hanscombe, K.B. and Curtis, C.J.C. and Davis, O.S.P. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Plomin, R. (2010) In search of genes associated with risk for psychopathic tendencies in children: a two-stage genome-wide association study of pooled DNA. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines 51 (7), pp. 780-8. ISSN 0021-9630.
- Davis, O.S.P. and Butcher, L.M. and Docherty, S.J. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Curtis, C.J.C. and Simpson, M.A. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Plomin, R. (2010) A three-stage genome-wide association study of general cognitive ability: hunting the small effects. Behavior Genetics 40 (6), pp. 759-67. ISSN 0001-8244.
- Docherty, S.J. and Davis, O.S.P. and Kovas, Y. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Dale, P.S. and Petrill, S.A. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Plomin, R. (2010) A genome-wide association study identifies multiple loci associated with mathematics ability and disability. Genes, Brain, and Behavior 9 (2), pp. 234-47. ISSN 1601-183X.
- Meaburn, Emma L. and Fernandes, C. and Craig, I.W. and Plomin, R. and Schalkwyk, L.C. (2009) Assessing individual differences in genome-wide gene expression in human whole blood: reliability over four hours and stability over 10 months.. Twin Research and Human Genetics 12 (4), pp. 372-380. ISSN 1832-4274.
- Haworth, C. and Carnell, S. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Davis, O.S.P. and Plomin, R. and Wardle, J. (2008) Increasing heritability of BMI and stronger associations with the FTO gene over childhood. Obesity 16 (12), pp. 2663-2668. ISSN 1930-7381.
- Meaburn, Emma L. and Harlaar, N. and Craig, I.W. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Plomin, R. (2008) Quantitative trait locus association scan of early reading disability and ability using pooled DNA and 100K SNP microarrays in a sample of 5760 children. Molecular Psychiatry 13 (7), pp. 729-40. ISSN 1359-4184.
- Haworth, C. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Harlaar, N. and Plomin, R. (2007) Reading and generalist genes. Mind, Brain, and Education 1 (4), pp. 173-180. ISSN 1751-2271.
- Meaburn, Emma L. and Butcher, L.M. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Plomin, R. (2006) Genotyping pooled DNA using 100K SNP microarrays: a step towards genomewide association scans. Nucleic Acids Research 34 (4), pp. e27. ISSN 0305-1048.
- Harlaar, N. and Butcher, L.M. and Meaburn, Emma L. and Sham, P. and Craig, I.W. and Plomin, R. (2005) A behavioural genomic analysis of DNA markers associated with general cognitive ability in 7-year-olds. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 46 (10), pp. 1097-107. ISSN 0021-9630.
- Butcher, L.M. and Meaburn, Emma and Knight, J. and Sham, P.C. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Craig, I.W. and Plomin, R. (2005) SNPs, microarrays and pooled DNA: identification of four loci associated with mild mental impairment in a sample of 6000 children. Human Molecular Genetics 14 (10), pp. 1315-1325. ISSN 0964-6906.
- Butcher, L.M. and Meaburn, Emma and Dale, P.S. and Sham, P. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Craig, I.W. and Plomin, R. (2005) Association analysis of mild mental impairment using DNA pooling to screen 432 brain-expressed single-nucleotide polymorphisms. Molecular Psychiatry 10 (4), pp. 384-392. ISSN 1359-4184.
- Meaburn, Emma and Butcher, L.M. and Liu, L. and Fernandes, C. and Hansen, V. and Al-Chalabi, A. and Plomin, R. and Craig, I.W. and Schalkwyk, L.C. (2005) Genotyping DNA pools on microarrays: tackling the QTL problem of large samples and large numbers of SNPs. BMC Genomics 6 (52), ISSN 1471-2164.
- Simpson, C.L. and Knight, J. and Butcher, L.M. and Hansen, V.K. and Meaburn, Emma and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Craig, I.W. and Powell, J.F. and Sham, P.C. and Al-Chalabi, A. (2005) A central resource for accurate allele frequency estimation from pooled DNA genotyped on DNA microarrays. Nucleic Acids Research 33 (3), pp. e25. ISSN 0305-1048.
- Craig, I. and Meaburn, Emma and Butcher, L.M. and Hill, L. and Plomin, R. (2005) Single-nucleotide polymorphism genotyping in DNA pools. Methods In Molecular Biology 311, pp. 147-164. ISSN 1940-6029.
- Butcher, L.M. and Meaburn, Emma and Liu, L. and Fernandes, C. and Hill, L. and Al-Chalabi, A. and Plomin, R. and Schalkwyk, L.C. and Craig, I.W. (2004) Genotyping pooled DNA on microarrays: a systematic genome screen of thousands of SNPs in large samples to detect QTLs for complex traits. Behavior Genetics 34 (5), pp. 549-555. ISSN 0001-8244.
- Meaburn, Emma and Dale, P.S. and Craig, I.W. and Plomin, R. (2002) Language-impaired children: no sign of the FOXP2 mutation. NeuroReport 13 (8), pp. 1075-1077. ISSN 0959-4965.
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Business and community
Business and community
Outreach
An up-to-date summary of my public engagement activities can be found here