University’s research award 2025 is given for discovering genetic mechanisms affecting female reproductive health

The University of Tartu research award 2025 is granted to the research team led by Professor of Genomic Epidemiology Triin Laisk for their outstanding work in clarifying the molecular mechanisms underlying women’s health disorders, illustrating the potential of genetic studies for better understanding women’s health.

According to Vice Rector for Research Mari Moora, chair of the evaluation committee, the studies published last year under the leadership and with the contribution of Triin Laisk’s team stand out for their breadth, scientific weight and societal impact.

The research, based on large-scale genome-wide association studies, includes genetic data from hundreds of thousands of women from the Estonian Biobank and Finland’s FinnGen project. As a novel approach, nearly fifty diagnoses related to women’s health and the connections between them were analysed simultaneously. The results make it possible to move from a symptom-based approach in treating women’s health disorders towards understanding the biological causes of diseases and adopting a more holistic view of women’s health, as well as developing more precise prevention and treatment options.

Triin Laisk has been working on women’s health genetics since her student days. She says that long-term dedication to one field has created the expertise and collaboration network needed to conduct world-class research. “I am happy to see that among the recognised articles is a study based on analyses originally intended as practice exercises for my own students. The students who started working with us during their master’s studies are now halfway through their doctoral studies, and we will certainly be hearing more about their exciting projects. Since we began these analyses without specific hypotheses, the project offered many pleasant surprises and scientific ‘aha’ moments. The feedback from colleagues has been very positive, and they can, in turn, use the datasets we created in their own work, which illustrates the collaborative nature of our field,” Laisk said.

The award is given to Professor of Genomic Epidemiology Triin Laisk, Professor in Bioinformatics Reedik Mägi, Junior Research Fellows in Genomics Jelisaveta Džigurski and Valentina Rukins and Specialist Fanny-Dhelia Pajuste.

The University of Tartu research award is given to recognise a university’s academic staff member or working group who has stood out by an extraordinary achievement in basic or applied research in the previous year. This time, there were 14 nominations for the research award.

The results of the research conducted by Triin Laisk’s team have been published in leading journals in the field, including Nature Medicine. These studies have received international recognition and have thereby increased the visibility of Estonian research.

Publications

• Pathare, Amruta DS et al. "A large-scale genome-wide association study on female genital tract polyps highlights role of DNA repair, cell proliferation, and cell growth." Human Reproduction 40.4 (2025): 750–763. https://doi.org/10.1093/humrep/deaf025
• Pujol Gualdo, Natàlia et al. "Atlas of genetic and phenotypic associations across 42 female reproductive health diagnoses." Nature Medicine (2025): 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-025-03543-8
• McGrath, Isabelle M. et al. "Interaction between genetic risk and comorbid conditions in endometriosis." Human Genetics and Genomics Advances 6.3 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xhgg.2025.100456
• Ramachandran, Dhanya et al. "GWAS meta-analysis identifies five susceptibility loci for endometrial cancer." EBioMedicine 118 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ebiom.2025.105830