About
Our research
Youth-GEMs is organised in specialised sub-teams, known as Work-Packages (WPs), each led by a project partner. These teams bring together different partner organisations to collaborate on specific tasks and activities aimed at achieving the project’s overarching goals.
Work Package 1
Coordination & Project Management
WP1 role is ensuring the efficient coordination, organisation, communication, and administration of the Youth-Gems project. This team is responsible for managing the project’s finances, assessing potential risks, and implementing contingency plans where necessary. WP1 also oversees legal and ethical compliance across the entire project, as well as managing the innovation process, which includes data management, publication, and intellectual property management.
Work Package 2
Engagement, Ethics & Networking
WP2 is dedicated to actively engaging all relevant stakeholders in the Youth-GEMs project and ensuring that the findings are effectively shared with the wider community. A key focus is raising mental health awareness among young people, public health officers, and healthcare workers and engage them in working on solutions together.
To achieve this, WP2 employs a “participatory health research” approach, where young experts aged 16 to 26 play a central role. By creating a learning community where ideas and stories are exchanged, Youth-GEMs integrates diverse knowledge and insights to shape the course of its research. Key activities include informal meetings called science café, growing the project’s network, storytelling, e-health modules, and the communication and dissemination of the project activities and results. In partnership with Euro Youth Mental Health, WP2 ensures that Young Experts are involved at every stage of the project, alongside university students, carers, teachers, scientists, and other professionals.
Work Package 3
Data Management
In the Youth-GEMs project, researchers are collecting extensive data to understand what factors contribute to the development of mental health issues in young people, ranging from life events to genetic influences. WP3 is responsible for managing and organizing this large volume of data, ensuring that all information from various sources is consistently collected, described, and translated through a process called data harmonization. This process ensures the data is reliable and easily usable in research.
Due to the sensitive nature of some of the data, such as genetic information, WP3 implements strict protocols to protect it, ensuring secure handling and analysis.
To promote collaboration and make this large volume of data available for exploration and reuse by other researchers and future studies, we implement a data discovery technology called Beacon. Beacon enhances the findability, allowing researchers to efficiently locate datasets of interest. Importantly, this is done in a way that protects patient privacy and ensures compliance with ethical and regulatory standards.
Work Package 4
Functional Genomics of the Human Brain
WP4 explores the complex relationship between our genes, the environment, and mental health by focusing on how genes affect brain function. The team studies gene regulatory elements, which are sections of DNA that control how genes are expressed in different cell types of the brain. This process is particularly important during critical developmental stages such as childhood and adolescence.
By understanding how these gene regulatory elements work and how they affect the development of brain cells at different stages of our growth, the team hopes to uncover why some individuals develop mental illnesses while others do not, even when they share the same genetic risk factors. Since this type of in-depth analysis is not possible in living individuals, the team examines brain cells from deceased donors and also cultures of human brain cells in the lab.
Identifying which brain cells are impacted during specific developmental stages and understanding how they are affected, could lead to better predictions of who is at risk for mental illnesses and inform strategies for prevention and treatment.
Work Package 5
Data Inference
WP5 focuses on understanding how genes and life experiences interact to impact mental health during early adulthood. By studying psychological, developmental, biological, and genetic factors, we learn why some people are more vulnerable to mental illness while others are more resilient.
To do this, WP5 looks at data already collected from large groups of young people worldwide, including the Netherlands, the UK, the US, and Australia. Researchers have already studied this data using statistical analysis, and now we will combine it with insights from the gene fine-tuning research in WP4 using machine learning—a type of artificial intelligence.
Machine learning will be used to find patterns in large datasets that might be difficult to spot otherwise. By examining the interactions between genetic and non-genetic factors, like childhood adversities or stressful life events, we hope to understand how these factors influence mental health outcomes.
Work Package 6
Data Integration & Prediction
WP6 focuses on using machine learning, a type of artificial intelligence, to analyse and predict mental health outcomes. In this WP, we are developing a system composed of a mobile app for young users and a clinical dashboard that integrates machine learning to analyse and predict mental health outcomes.
This system will help monitor the mental health of users by analysing clinical data, lifestyle factors, environmental influences, and behaviour. The goal is to enable early intervention, giving people the chance to prevent mental health issues before they start.
To ensure the system is accurate, inclusive, trustworthy, safe, ethical and user-friendly, experts from various fields, including AI, digital technology, clinical research, and mental health, are collaborating on its development.
Work Package 7
Clinical Innovation
WP7 package aims to ensure that the research from other work packages can make a real difference in the lives of young people and the professionals who support them. The goal of this WP is to conduct a clinical study involving about 1,000 young people in Europe and 1,000 in Australia who are seeking help for the first time.
This year-long study will investigate whether the findings from our project partners are useful for young people experiencing mental illness and their doctors. The study will help us identify the factors that influence how mental illness develops over time and explore potential ways to help those affected. Together with young experts, we will decide which factors are important to measure, and these will be included in the clinical study.
Work Package 8
Ethics requirements
This work package ensures that the project adheres to all ethical standards and requirements, ensuring that all activities are conducted responsibly and with respect for the participants’ rights and well-being.
