# Childhood Allergy and the NeOnatal Environment (CANOE) ECHO Pediatric Follow-Up and New Enrollment

> **NIH NIH UG3** · UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON · 2024 · $1,562,642

## Abstract

PROJECT ABSTRACT
Asthma is a complex, heterogenous condition with both genetic and environmental factors contributing to
disease. The epithelial barrier is the interface between environmental exposures and the host. Gene-
environment interaction studies demonstrate that early life exposures modify genetic risks in asthma, and
epigenetic changes, such as DNA methylation (DNAm) may mediate these effects. Additionally, epithelial
transcriptional changes link to childhood asthma. We propose to use both of these powerful technologies to
provide a mechanistic link from environmental exposure to asthma inception. We hypothesize that exposures
at the epithelial barrier related to the community (air pollution, nearby green space) and the individual
(microbiome) alter epithelial DNAm and transcriptional responses to promote the development of asthma. To
evaluate this hypothesis, we will leverage the ECHO Cohort protocol 3.0 to determine how prenatal and early
life individual and neighborhood level exposures contribute to nasal epithelial changes in infancy to promote
the development of wheezing (aim 1), determine how the these exposures, including the skin microbiome,
influence skin epithelial changes to promote atopic dermatitis and wheezing (aim 2), and elucidate how
individual and neighborhood characteristics influence maternal nasal epigenetic changes throughout
pregnancy, and how these changes relate to allergic diseases in the child (aim 4). Finally, we will follow
existing ECHO participants and recruit 350 pregnant women and 50 women preconception that give birth (for a
of total 400 births) into ECHO Cohort protocol 3.0 (aim 3). Importantly, throughout this proposal, we seek to
disentangle factors that may underlie health disparities by identifying the mechanisms by which environmental
exposures (that are often associated and conflated with race) cause asthma. We will identify precise molecular
targets for diagnosis and prevention. This information can be used to (1) establish non-invasive biomarkers
(from nasal or skin swabs) to identify infants at risk for asthma, (2) develop treatment strategies based on
altering patterns of microbial colonization or epithelial gene expression to promote health, and (3) identify
actionable exposures that underly health disparities for intervention.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10917312
- **Project number:** 5UG3OD035509-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON
- **Principal Investigator:** Anne Marie Singh
- **Activity code:** UG3 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $1,562,642
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2023-09-01 → 2025-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10917312

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10917312, Childhood Allergy and the NeOnatal Environment (CANOE) ECHO Pediatric Follow-Up and New Enrollment (5UG3OD035509-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10917312. Licensed CC0.

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