Summary
Dr Chowdhury read Natural Sciences at Cambridge University with Part II in Pharmacology in 2003. She then gained an MSc in Pharmacology at University of Oxford in 2004. She was awarded a PhD titled "Gap junction remodelling and conduction abnormalities in the heart" in 2011 from Imperial College London. She is now a Research Fellow in Electrophysiology and Pacing group and a member of the ElectroCardioMaths Programme of the Imperial Centre for Cardiac Engineering. Her interests lie in the electro-architecture of the myocardium and understanding structural factors which contribute to normal and abnormal electrograms.
Cardiac arrhythmias are a group of conditions in which the contraction of the heart is irregular, or faster or slower than normal, preventing the heart from carrying out its role of sustaining circulation. Abnormal electrical conduction through the heart can lead to arrhythmias. The contact electrogram, recorded from electrodes placed inside the heart can be used clinically to locate areas of abnormalities. Contact electrograms are routinely used in clinical procedures to guide therapy for arrhythmias. However, the content of the electrogram and pathophysiological changes are not well understood.
Dr Chowdhury's current work is to investigate the links between electrogram morphology, local cellular activity and architectural determinants of electrical propagation. Simple cell and tissue models are used to determine the fundamental relationships between the electro-architecture and electrogram characteristics, providing inputs for modelling these relationships. Signal feature extraction and correlation at this fundamental level can solve the inverse problem of determining cellular and tissue abnormalities from the electrogram using predictive machine learning algorithms. The ultimate goal is that these predictive algorithms could be used in the clinic to inform electrophysiology procedures.
Dr Chowdhury's previous and current grants include:
BHF Pilot grant for BIC MRI imaging "Gadolinium-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging identifies fibrosis in human cardiac tissue"
BHF Project Grant "Predicting myocardial architecture and electrophysiological function from electrogram morphology"
Rosetrees Trust "Bridging the gap from the bench to the bedside: Characterisation of intact human hearts"
NIHR BRC Grant "Complex Arrhythmias: a major clinical challenge for Imperial College ElectroCardioMaths Group"
Dr Chowdhury has been awarded numerous prizes including American Heart Association Travel Award, Heart Rhythm UK Young Investigators Award (runner up), Presidents Award for Outstanding Research Team and NHLI Post Doc Supervisor Award.
Dr Chowdhury has supervised over 15 undergraduate and postgraduate students and is lecturer, and previous examiner and committee member on the Cardiovascular BSc programme. She is currently Foundations module lead on the MSc in Cardiovascular and Respiratory Healthcare. She is also a mentor for the schools CREST award. She is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
Publications
Journals
Patel H, Sintou A, Chowdhury RA, et al., 2023, Evaluation of autoantibody binding to cardiac tissue in multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children and COVID-19 vaccination-induced myocarditis., Jama Network Open, Vol:6, ISSN:2574-3805, Pages:1-11
Kim MY, Nesbitt J, Koutsoftidis S, et al., 2023, Immunohistochemical characteristics of local sites that trigger atrial arrhythmias in response to high frequency stimulation, Ep Europace, Vol:25, ISSN:1099-5129, Pages:726-738
Reichart D, Lindberg EL, Maatz H, et al., 2022, Pathogenic variants damage cell composition and single-cell transcription in cardiomyopathies, Science, Vol:377, ISSN:0036-8075, Pages:1-13
Hesketh LM, Sikkel MB, Mahoney-Sanchez L, et al., 2022, OCT2013, an ischaemia-activated antiarrhythmic prodrug, devoid of the systemic side effects of lidocaine, British Journal of Pharmacology, Vol:179, ISSN:0007-1188, Pages:2037-2053
Scott A, Jackson T, Khalique Z, et al., 2022, Development of a CMR compatible large animal isolated heart model for direct comparison of beating and arrested hearts, Nmr in Biomedicine, Vol:35, ISSN:0952-3480