Olympe Chazara

Research summary
In pregnancy, the maternal immune system is regulating placental development and function. The dominant population of uterine leukocytes are Natural Killer (NK) cells, able to recognise MHC Class-I molecules on fetal trophoblast cells. I work in the Moffett group which identified that one particular maternal KIR haplotype and fetal HLA-C combination is associated with the major diseases of pregnancy: recurrent miscarriage, fetal growth restriction, and pre-eclampsia. The question is now to refine the outcome of the different KIR genes/HLA ligands interactions.

Funding: British Heart Foundation and the Centre for Trophoblast Research