Dr Nicole Warrington
Dr

Nicole Warrington

Email: 
Phone: 
+61 7 344 37347

Background

Dr Nicole Warrington is a NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow at the University of Queensland Institute for Molecular Bioscience. She has a strong background in statistical genetics and has been actively working towards understanding the genetic determinants of early life growth. Dr Warrington studied a Bachelor of Science at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, majoring in Mathematical Statistics and Psychology. She then completed an honours degree at The University of Western Australia, where she developed a keen interest for genetics, and was subsequently awarded an Australian Postgraduate Award to complete her PhD in statistical genetics and life-course epidemiology. During her PhD she spent time at the University of Toronto to gain experience in statistical modelling methods for longitudinal growth trajectories and conducted the first genome-wide association study of longitudinal growth trajectories over childhood. After completing her PhD, Dr Warrington started at the University of Queensland and focused on using genetics to inform about the relationship between birth weight and cardio-metabolic diseases in later life. She pioneered a new statistical method to partition genetic effects on birth weight into maternal and fetal components, and combined this method with a causal modelling approach, Mendelian randomization. This method was instrumental in demonstrating the relationship between birth weight and adult hypertension is driven by genetic effects, over-turning 30 years of research into the effects of intrauterine programming. More recently, her research focus has broadened to determine whether rapid weight growth across early life, including fetal development, childhood and adolescence, causally increases risk of cardio-metabolic disease and in doing so, hopes to identify optimal times across the life-course where interventions could reduce the incidence of cardio-metabolic diseases.

Availability

Dr Nicole Warrington is:
Available for supervision

Fields of research

Biological Sciences Biomedical and Clinical Sciences Biostatistics Foetal development and medicine Gene mapping Genetics Mathematical Sciences Statistics

Qualifications

  • Doctor of Philosophy, University of Western Australia

Research interests

  • Developmental origins of health and disease

    The development of obesity often occurs in early life and tends to persist into adulthood. Unfavourable growth in early life is also associated with adverse cardio-metabolic outcomes in later life, such as type two diabetes and heart disease. Understanding the mechanisms underlying this relationship is a vital step in combating these lifestyle diseases and evaluating the likely success of early interventions. This research aims to address the following questions: (a) What maternal characteristics modify the early life environment and cause rapid early life weight growth in her offspring? (b) Is there a time period in early life where rapid weight growth causes increased risk of cardio-metabolic disease in later life, independent of adult obesity? Dr Warrington is a leading member of the Early Growth Genetics (EGG) consortium, which brings together studies from around the world with growth related phenotypes and genetic data in order to conduct large-scale genetic research. The EGG consortium have conducted several large genome-wide association studies of growth phenotypes, which are published in high impact journals including Nature and Nature Genetics. The results from these genome-wide association studies are then used to perform causal modelling to help disentangle the relationship between childhood growth and later life cardio-metabolic disease risk.

Search Professor Nicole Warrington’s works on UQ eSpace

114 works between 2007 and 2024
All (114) Journal Article (100) Book Chapter (1) Conference Publication (13)

41 - 60 of 114 works

2018

Journal Article

Using structural equation modelling to jointly estimate maternal and fetal effects on birthweight in the UK Biobank

Warrington, Nicole M., Freathy, Rachel M., Neale, Michael C. and Evans, David M. (2018). Using structural equation modelling to jointly estimate maternal and fetal effects on birthweight in the UK Biobank. International Journal of Epidemiology, 47 (4), 1229-1241. doi: 10.1093/ije/dyy015

Using structural equation modelling to jointly estimate maternal and fetal effects on birthweight in the UK Biobank

2018

Conference Publication

Maternal and fetal genetic effects on birth weight and their relevance to cardio-metabolic disease

Beaumont, Robin N., Warrington, Nicole M., Horikoshi, Momoko, Day, Felix R., Ong, Ken K., McCarthy, Mark I., Perry, John R. B., Freathy, Rachel M. and Evans, David M. (2018). Maternal and fetal genetic effects on birth weight and their relevance to cardio-metabolic disease. 27th Annual Meeting of the International-Genetic-Epidemiology-Society (IGES), San Diego, Ca, United States, 14-16 October 2018. Hoboken, NJ, United States: John Wiley & Sons.

Maternal and fetal genetic effects on birth weight and their relevance to cardio-metabolic disease

2017

Journal Article

Maternal and fetal genetic contribution to gestational weight gain

Warrington, N. M., Richmond, R., Fenstra, B., Myhre, R., Gaillard, R., Paternoster, L., Wang, C. A., Beaumont, R. N., Das, S., Murcia, M., Barton, S. J., Espinosa, A., Thiering, E., Atalay, M., Pitkänen, N., Ntalla, I., Jonsson, A. E., Freathy, R., Karhunen, V., Tiesler, C. M. T., Allard, C., Crawford, A., Ring, S. M., Melbye, M., Magnus, P., Rivadeneira, F., Skotte, L., Hansen, T., Marsh, J. ... Lawlor, D. A. (2017). Maternal and fetal genetic contribution to gestational weight gain. International Journal of Obesity (2005), 42 (4), 775-784. doi: 10.1038/ijo.2017.248

Maternal and fetal genetic contribution to gestational weight gain

2017

Journal Article

Identification of 153 new loci associated with heel bone mineral density and functional involvement of GPC6 in osteoporosis

Kemp, John P., Morris, John A., Medina-Gomez, Carolina, Forgetta, Vincenzo, Warrington, Nicole M., Youlten, Scott E., Zheng, Jie, Gregson, Celia L., Grundberg, Elin, Trajanoska, Katerina, Logan, John G., Pollard, Andrea S., Sparkes, Penny C., Ghirardello, Elena J., Allen, Rebecca, Leitch, Victoria D., Butterfield, Natalie C., Komla-Ebri, Davide, Adoum, Anne-Tounsia, Curry, Katharine F., White, Jacqueline K., Kussy, Fiona, Greenlaw, Keelin M., Xu, Changjiang, Harvey, Nicholas C., Cooper, Cyrus, Adams, David J., Greenwood, Celia M. T., Maurano, Matthew T. ... Evans, David M. (2017). Identification of 153 new loci associated with heel bone mineral density and functional involvement of GPC6 in osteoporosis. Nature Genetics, 49 (10), 1468-1475. doi: 10.1038/ng.3949

Identification of 153 new loci associated with heel bone mineral density and functional involvement of GPC6 in osteoporosis

2017

Journal Article

Large-scale GWAS identifies multiple loci for hand grip strength providing biological insights into muscular fitness

Willems, Sara M., Wright, Daniel J., Day, Felix R., Trajanoska, Katerina, Joshi, Peter K., Morris, John A., Matteini, Amy M., Garton, Fleur C., Grarup, Niels, Oskolkov, Nikolay, Thalamuthu, Anbupalam, Mangino, Massimo, Liu, Jun, Demirkan, Ayse, Lek, Monkol, Xu, Liwen, Wang, Guan, Oldmeadow, Christopher, Gaulton, Kyle J., Lotta, Luca A., Miyamoto-Mikami, Eri, Rivas, Manuel A., White, Tom, Loh, Po-Ru, Aadahl, Mette, Amin, Najaf, Attia, John R., Austin, Krista, Benyamin, Beben ... Ohlsson, Claes (2017). Large-scale GWAS identifies multiple loci for hand grip strength providing biological insights into muscular fitness. Nature Communications, 8 (1) 16015, 16015. doi: 10.1038/ncomms16015

Large-scale GWAS identifies multiple loci for hand grip strength providing biological insights into muscular fitness

2017

Journal Article

Using Mendelian randomization to determine causal effects of maternal pregnancy (intrauterine) exposures on offspring outcomes: Sources of bias and methods for assessing them

Lawlor, Deborah, Richmond, Rebecca, Warrington, Nicole , McMahon, George, Davery Smith, George, Bowden, Jack and Evans, David M. (2017). Using Mendelian randomization to determine causal effects of maternal pregnancy (intrauterine) exposures on offspring outcomes: Sources of bias and methods for assessing them. Wellcome Open Research, 2 (11) 11, 11. doi: 10.12688/wellcomeopenres.10567.1

Using Mendelian randomization to determine causal effects of maternal pregnancy (intrauterine) exposures on offspring outcomes: Sources of bias and methods for assessing them

2017

Journal Article

Shared genetic variants suggest common pathways in allergy and autoimmune diseases

Kreiner, Eskil, Waage, Johannes, Standl, Marie, Brix, Susanne, Pers, Tune H., Couto Alves, Alexessander, Warrington, Nicole M., Tiesler, Carla M. T., Fuertes, Elaine, Franke, Lude, Hirschhorn, Joel N., James, Alan, Simpson, Angela, Tung, Joyce Y., Koppelman, Gerard H., Postma, Dirkje S., Pennell, Craig E., Jarvelin, Marjo-Riitta, Custovic, Adnan, Timpson, Nicholas, Ferreira, Manuel A., Strachan, David P., Henderson, John, Hinds, David, Bisgaard, Hans and Bønnelykke, Klaus (2017). Shared genetic variants suggest common pathways in allergy and autoimmune diseases. Allergy: European Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, 140 (3), 771-781. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2016.10.055

Shared genetic variants suggest common pathways in allergy and autoimmune diseases

2017

Journal Article

LD Hub: a centralized database and web interface to perform LD score regression that maximizes the potential of summary level GWAS data for SNP heritability and genetic correlation analysis

Zheng, Jie, Erzurumluoglu, A. Mesut, Elsworth, Benjamin L., Kemp, John P., Howe, Laurence, Haycock, Philip C., Hemani, Gibran, Tansey, Katherine, Laurin, Charles, St Pourcain, Beate, Warrington, Nicole M., Finucane, Hilary K., Price, Alkes L., Bulik-Sullivan, Brendan K., Anttila, Verneri, Paternoster, Lavinia, Gaunt, Tom R., Evans, David M. and Neale, Benjamin M. (2017). LD Hub: a centralized database and web interface to perform LD score regression that maximizes the potential of summary level GWAS data for SNP heritability and genetic correlation analysis. Bioinformatics, 33 (2), 272-279. doi: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btw613

LD Hub: a centralized database and web interface to perform LD score regression that maximizes the potential of summary level GWAS data for SNP heritability and genetic correlation analysis

2017

Conference Publication

Performing Mendelian randomization using structural equation models

Evans, David and Warrington, Nicole (2017). Performing Mendelian randomization using structural equation models. 47th Annual Meeting of the Behavior-Genetics-Association (BGA), Oslo Norway, 28 June - 1 July 2017. New York NY United States: Springer.

Performing Mendelian randomization using structural equation models

2016

Conference Publication

Genome-wide association study of 6,939 individuals identifies five novel loci and suggests that prenatal exposure to testosterone is not a major determinant of individual differences in 2D:4D finger ratio

Warrington, Nicole, Hemani, Gibran, Hysi, Pirro, Mangino, Massimo, McMahon, George, Hickey, Martha, Wolke, Dieter, Montgomery, Grant, Pennell, Craig, Spector, Tim, Martin, Nicholas, Medland, Sarah and Evans, David (2016). Genome-wide association study of 6,939 individuals identifies five novel loci and suggests that prenatal exposure to testosterone is not a major determinant of individual differences in 2D:4D finger ratio. 46th Annual Meeting of the Behavior-Genetics-Association, Brisbane Australia, Jun 20-23, 2016. NEW YORK: SPRINGER.

Genome-wide association study of 6,939 individuals identifies five novel loci and suggests that prenatal exposure to testosterone is not a major determinant of individual differences in 2D:4D finger ratio

2016

Conference Publication

Locus Discovery in Genome-wide Association Studies using Bivariate Analysis

Warrington, Nicole M. and Evans, David M. (2016). Locus Discovery in Genome-wide Association Studies using Bivariate Analysis. Annual Meeting of the International-Genetic-Epidemiology-Society, Toronto Canada, Oct 24-26, 2016. HOBOKEN: WILEY-BLACKWELL.

Locus Discovery in Genome-wide Association Studies using Bivariate Analysis

2016

Conference Publication

LD hub and MR-base: online platforms for preforming LD score regression and Mendelian randomization analysis using GWAS summary data

Zheng, Jie, Haycock, Philip, Hemani, Gibran, Elsworth, Benjamin, Shihab, Hashem, Laurin, Charles, Erzurumluoglu, Mesut, Howe, Laurence, Wade, Kaitlin, Warrington, Nicole, Finucane, Hilary, Price, Alkes, Anttila, Verneri, Paternoster, Lavinia, Martin, Richard, Relton, Caroline, Gaunt, Tom, Smith, George Davey, Neale, Benjamin and Evans, David (2016). LD hub and MR-base: online platforms for preforming LD score regression and Mendelian randomization analysis using GWAS summary data. 46th Annual Meeting of the Behavior-Genetics-Association, Brisbane Australia, Jun 20-23, 2016. NEW YORK: SPRINGER.

LD hub and MR-base: online platforms for preforming LD score regression and Mendelian randomization analysis using GWAS summary data

2016

Journal Article

Genome-wide associations for birth weight and correlations with adult disease

Horikoshi, Momoko, Beaumont, Robin N., Day, Felix R., Warrington, Nicole M., Kooijman, Marjolein N., Fernandez-Tajes, Juan, Feenstra, Bjarke, van Zuydam, Natalie R., Gaulton, Kyle J., Grarup, Niels, Bradfield, Jonathan P., Strachan, David P., Li-Gao, Ruifang, Ahluwalia, Tarunveer S., Kreiner, Eskil, Rueedi, Rico, Lyytikainen, Leo-Pekka, Cousminer, Diana L., Wu, Ying, Thiering, Elisabeth, Wang, Carol A., Have, Christian T., Hottenga, Jouke-Jan, Vilor-Tejedor, Natalia, Joshi, Peter K., Boh, Eileen Tai Hui, Ntalla, Ioanna, Pitkanen, Niina, Mahajan, Anubha ... Freathy, Rachel M. (2016). Genome-wide associations for birth weight and correlations with adult disease. Nature, 538 (7624), 248-252. doi: 10.1038/nature19806

Genome-wide associations for birth weight and correlations with adult disease

2015

Conference Publication

Shared genetic origins of allergy and autoimmune diseases

Waage, J. E., Kreiner-Moller, E., Standl, M., Brix, S., Pers, T. H., Alves, A. C., Warrington, N. M., Tiesler, C. M., Fuertes, E., Franke, L., Hirschhorn, J. N., James, A., Simpson, A., Tung, J. Y., Koppelman, G. H., Postma, D. S., Pennel, C. E., Jarvelin, M-R, Custovic, A., Timpson, N., Ferreira, M. A., Strachan, D. P., Hinds, D., Bisgaard, H. and Bonnelykke, K. (2015). Shared genetic origins of allergy and autoimmune diseases. Congress of the European-Academy-of-Allergy-and-Clinical-Immunology, Barcelona Spain, Jun 06-10, 2015. HOBOKEN: WILEY-BLACKWELL.

Shared genetic origins of allergy and autoimmune diseases

2015

Journal Article

Genetic variants in adult bone mineral density and fracture risk genes are associated with the rate of bone mineral density acquisition in adolescence

Warrington, Nicole M., Kemp, John P., Tilling, Kate, Tobias, Jonathan H. and Evans, David M. (2015). Genetic variants in adult bone mineral density and fracture risk genes are associated with the rate of bone mineral density acquisition in adolescence. Human Molecular Genetics, 24 (14) ddv143, 4158-4166. doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddv143

Genetic variants in adult bone mineral density and fracture risk genes are associated with the rate of bone mineral density acquisition in adolescence

2015

Journal Article

A genome-wide association study of body mass index across early life and childhood

Warrington, Nicole M., Howe, Laura D., Paternoster, Lavinia, Kaakinen, Marika, Herrala, Sauli, Huikari, Ville, Wu, Yan Yan, Kemp, John P., Timpson, Nicholas J., Pourcain, Beate St, Smith, George Davey, Tilling, Kate, Jarvelin, Marjo-Riitta, Pennell, Craig E., Evans, David M., Lawlor, Debbie A., Briollais, Laurent and Palmer, Lyle J. (2015). A genome-wide association study of body mass index across early life and childhood. International Journal of Epidemiology, 44 (2) dyv077, 700-712. doi: 10.1093/ije/dyv077

A genome-wide association study of body mass index across early life and childhood

2015

Journal Article

Genome-wide association study of blood lead shows multiple associations near ALAD

Warrington, Nicole M., Zhu, Gu, Dy, Veronica, Heath, Andrew C., Madden, Pamela A. F., Hemani, Gibran, Kemp, John P., Mcmahon, George, St Pourcain, Beate, Timpson, Nicholas J., Taylor, Caroline M., Golding, Jean, Lawlor, Debbie A., Steer, Colin, Montgomery, Grant W., Martin, Nicholas G., Smith, George Davey, Evans, David M. and Whitfield, John B. (2015). Genome-wide association study of blood lead shows multiple associations near ALAD. Human Molecular Genetics, 24 (13) ddv112, 3871-3879. doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddv112

Genome-wide association study of blood lead shows multiple associations near ALAD

2015

Journal Article

Brief report: intestinal dysbiosis in ankylosing spondylitis

Costello, Mary-Ellen, Ciccia, Francesco, Willner, Dana, Warrington, Nicole, Robinson, Philip C., Gardiner, Brooke, Marshall, Mhairi, Kenna, Tony J., Triolo. Giovanni and Brown, Matthew A. (2015). Brief report: intestinal dysbiosis in ankylosing spondylitis. Arthritis and Rheumatology, 67 (3), 686-691. doi: 10.1002/art.38967

Brief report: intestinal dysbiosis in ankylosing spondylitis

2015

Journal Article

A novel common variant in DCST2 is associated with length in early life and height in adulthood

van der Valk, Ralf J. P., Kreiner-Moller, Eskil, Kooijman, Marjolein N., Guxens, Monica, Stergiakouli, Evangelia, Saaf, Annika, Bradfield, Jonathan P., Geller, Frank, Hayes, M. Geoffrey, Cousminer, Diana L., Koerner, Antje, Thiering, Elisabeth, Curtin, John A., Myhre, Ronny, Huikari, Ville, Joro, Raimo, Kerkhof, Marjan, Warrington, Nicole M., Pitkanen, Niina, Ntalla, Ioanna, Horikoshi, Momoko, Veijola, Riitta, Freathy, Rachel M., Teo, Yik-Ying, Barton, Sheila J., Evans, David M., Kemp, John P., St Pourcain, Beate, Ring, Susan M. ... for the Early Growth Genetics (EGG) Consortium (2015). A novel common variant in DCST2 is associated with length in early life and height in adulthood. Human Molecular Genetics, 24 (4) ddu510, 1155-1168. doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddu510

A novel common variant in DCST2 is associated with length in early life and height in adulthood

2015

Conference Publication

Large scale genome-wide association study for birth weight identifies 13 novel loci and reveals genetic links with a variety of adult metabolic and anthropometric traits

Horikoahi, Momoko, Day, Felix R., Perry, John R. B., Hottenga, Jouke-Jan, Li-Gao, Ruifang, Beaumont, Robin, Warrington, Nicole M. and Timpson, Nicholas J. (2015). Large scale genome-wide association study for birth weight identifies 13 novel loci and reveals genetic links with a variety of adult metabolic and anthropometric traits. Annual Meeting of the International-Genetic-Epidemiology-Society (IGES), Baltimore, Md, United States, Oct 04-06 2015. Hoboken, NJ, United States: John Wiley & Sons. doi: 10.1002/gepi.21916

Large scale genome-wide association study for birth weight identifies 13 novel loci and reveals genetic links with a variety of adult metabolic and anthropometric traits

Current funding

  • 2022 - 2027
    Using genetics to identify optimal times to intervene on early life growth and reduce future risk of cardio-metabolic disease
    NHMRC Investigator Grants
    Open grant

Past funding

  • 2019 - 2022
    Identifying maternal and fetal genetic determinants of infant birthweight and their relationship to offspring cardiometabolic risk
    NHMRC Project Grant
    Open grant
  • 2017 - 2020
    Using Methods in Genetic Epidemiology to Elucidate the Relationship Between Viral Infection and Risk of Autoimmune Disease
    NHMRC Project Grant
    Open grant
  • 2016 - 2019
    Investigating the Genetic Correlation Underlying the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease
    NHMRC Early Career Fellowships
    Open grant
  • 2015
    Bivariate genome-wide association study of birth weight and endophenotypes related to five diseases in later life
    UWA-UQ Bilateral Research Collaboration Award
    Open grant
  • 2015
    Bivariate genome-wide association study of birth weight and endophenotypes related to five diseases in later life.
    UQ Early Career Researcher
    Open grant

Availability

Dr Nicole Warrington is:
Available for supervision

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Supervision history

Current supervision

  • Doctor Philosophy

    Using multi-omics approaches to characterise determinants of early growth trajectories and their consequences on later life health

    Principal Advisor

    Other advisors: Honorary Professor Jake Gratten, Professor David Evans

  • Doctor Philosophy

    Developing and Applying Statistical Genetics Methods to Elucidate the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease

    Associate Advisor

    Other advisors: Professor David Evans

  • Doctor Philosophy

    Investigating the time and tissue dependent genetic architecture of complex traits

    Associate Advisor

    Other advisors: Associate Professor Loic Yengo

  • Doctor Philosophy

    Identifying genetic and cellular determinants of musculoskeletal disorders

    Associate Advisor

    Other advisors: Dr John Kemp

Completed supervision

Enquiries

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