Lectures and seminars MEB seminar: ICE FALCON: a method for assessing causation analogous to Mendelian Randomization

Speaker: Dr Shuai Li, Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, The University of Melbourne and Centre for Cancer Genetic Epidemiology, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, University of Cambridge

Abstract: Whether associations found by observational studies are causal, and in which direction, are important issues with clinical and aetiological implications. We have developed ICE FALCON (Inference about Causation from Examination of Familial Confounding), an analytical approach to make inference about causation using data of twins or other family members. Analyses show that ICE FALCON gives the same conclusion as that from Mendelian Randomization (MR), a commonly used statistical causal inference method that relies on certain assumptions and genetic data. Resembling a bidirectional MR with co-twin acting as a surrogate instrumental variable, ICE FALCON has some major advantages over MR, including not relying on measured genetic data and more broadly for the trait of interest. This talk will introduce the methodology of ICE FALCON, its comparison with MR, and its applications to observational DNA methylation associations with lifestyle risk factors.