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Bilde av Urbarova, Ilona H.
Photo: Jonatan Ottesen
Bilde av Urbarova, Ilona H.
Researcher in molecular cancer epidemiology Department of Community Medicine ilona.urbarova@uit.no Tromsø You can find me here

Ilona H. Urbarova

Job description

Ilona H. Urbarova is a researcher in molecular biology and bioinformatics at the Faculty of Health Sciences at UiT. Through her research she aims to find new molecular biomarkers of early detection and better prognosis for lung cancer patients through sequencing, array and integrative analyses of blood or tissue samples, and their association with immune cells. She has a long experience (over 10 years) with analyses of different sequencing data at genome, transcriptome and proteome level (including epigenomics, miRNA expression and de novo genomics and transcriptomics). She is currently also part of other studies that are looking at inflammatory blood markers and their association with colorectal cancer, periodontitis or human social exposome. She has also been involved in EU-funded PERFORCE3 project studying environmental contaminants and is part of EU-funded DISCERN project that tries to identify the causes of three poorly understood cancers in Europe – renal, pancreatic, and colorectal cancer.

Ilona H. Urbarova is a researcher in Systems Epidemiology group at the Department of Community Medicine (ISM) and Translational Cancer Research Group at the Department of Clinical Medicine (IKM).

Google Scholar

  • 1
    Luca Pestarino, Shannon Renee Turzanski Fortner, Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Ioannis Fotopoulos, Ilona H. Urbarova, Oluf Dimitri Røe et al.:
    Recommendations for Validating Omics Prediction Models: Insights from a Lung Cancer RNA Biomarker Study
    Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention 2025 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Elise Marlen Paulsen, Tonje Bjørndal Braaten, Ilona Halva Urbarova, Magritt Brustad :
    Pre-diagnostic 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels and subsite-specific colorectal cancer risk: A nested case-control study from the Norwegian Women and Cancer Study (NOWAC)
    British Journal of Nutrition 2025 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Dagny Førde, Thomas Karsten Kilvær, Mona Irene Pedersen, Egil Støre Blix, Ilona Halva Urbarova, Erna-Elise Paulsen et al.:
    High density of TCF1+ stem-like tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes is associated with favorable disease-specific survival in NSCLC
    Frontiers in Immunology 2024 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ilona Halva Urbarova, Anne Heidi Skogholt, Yi-Qian Sun, Xiao-Mei Mai, Bjørn Henning Grønberg, Torkjel Manning Sandanger et al.:
    Increased expression of individual genes in whole blood is associated with late-stage lung cancer at and close to diagnosis
    Scientific Reports 2023 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Sebastian Löding, Ulrika Andersson, Rudolf Kaaks, Matthias B. Schulze, Valeria Pala, Ilona Halva Urbarova et al.:
    Altered plasma metabolite levels can be detected years before a glioma diagnosis
    JCI Insight 2023 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ana Carolina Miranda Fernandes Coelho, Lara Cioni, Wendy van Dreunen, Vivian Berg, Karin Charlotta Maria Rylander, Ilona Halva Urbarova et al.:
    Legacy perfluoroalkyl acids and their oxidizable precursors in plasma samples of Norwegian women
    Environment International 2023 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ruomei Li, Sabin Bhandari, Inigo Zubiavrre Martinez, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Ilona Halva Urbarova, Bård Smedsrød et al.:
    Changes in the proteome and secretome of rat liver sinusoidal endothelial cells during early primary culture and effects of dexamethasone
    PLOS ONE 2022 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Anne Heidi Skogholt, Ilona Halva Urbarova, Robin Mjelle, Erna-Elise Paulsen, Tom Dønnem et al.:
    Increased levels of microRNA-320 in blood serum and plasma is associated with imminent and advanced lung cancer
    Molecular Oncology 2022 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Vivian Viallon, Mathilde His, Sabina Rinaldi, Marie Breeur, Audrey Gicquiau, Bertrand Hémon et al.:
    A new pipeline for the normalization and pooling of metabolomics data
    Metabolites 2021 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Karine Alcala, Ilona Urbarova, Karl Smith Byrne, Florence Guida, Torkjel M Sandanger et al.:
    Systemic inflammation markers and cancer incidence in the UK Biobank
    European Journal of Epidemiology (EJE) 2021 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Jorunn Pauline Cavanagh, Fatemeh Askarian, Maria Pain, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Ilona Urbarova, Sun Nyunt Wai et al.:
    Proteome profiling of secreted and membrane vesicle associated proteins of an invasive and a commensal Staphylococcus haemolyticus isolate.
    Data in Brief 2019 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Md Ashraful Islam, Ilona Urbarova, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Inigo Zubiavrre Martinez :
    LARGE-SCALE SECRETOME ANALYSES UNVEIL THE SUPERIOR IMMUNOSUPPRESSIVE PHENOTYPE OF UMBILICAL CORD STROMAL CELLS AS COMPARED TO OTHER ADULT MESENCHYMAL STROMAL CELLS
    European Cells and Materials 20. February 2019 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Md Ashraful Islam, Vegard Fossum, Ann Kristin Hansen, Ilona Urbarova, Gunnar Knutsen, Inigo Zubiavrre Martinez :
    In vitro chondrogenic potency of surplus chondrocytes from autologous transplantation procedures does not predict short-term clinical outcomes
    BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders 2019 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ilona Urbarova, Sylvain Forêt, Per Mikael Dahl, Åse Emblem, Marco Milazzo, Jason M. Hall-Spencer et al.:
    Ocean acidification at a coastal CO2 vent induces expression of stress-related transcripts and transposable elements in the sea anemone Anemonia viridis
    PLOS ONE 2019 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ilona Urbarova, Hardip Patel, Sylvain Forêt, Bård Ove Karlsen, Tor Erik Jørgensen, Jason M. Hall-Spencer et al.:
    Elucidating the Small Regulatory RNA Repertoire of the Sea Anemone Anemonia viridis Based on Whole Genome and Small RNA Sequencing
    Genome Biology and Evolution (GBE) 2018 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Jorunn Pauline Cavanagh, Maria Pain, Fatemeh Askarian, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Ilona Urbarova, Sun Nyunt Wai et al.:
    Comparative exoproteome profiling of an invasive and a commensal Staphylococcus haemolyticus isolate
    Journal of Proteomics 2018 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • 1
    Stine Figenschau, Erik Knutsen, Ilona Urbarova, Christopher Graham Fenton, Bryan Elston, Maria Perander et al.:
    ICAM1 expression is induced by proinflammatory cytokines and associated with TLS formation in aggressive breast cancer subtypes
    Scientific Reports 2018 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Sylvia Ighem Chi, Ilona Urbarova, Steinar Daae Johansen :
    Expression of homing endonuclease gene and insertion-like element in sea anemone mitochondrial genomes: Lesson learned from Anemonia viridis
    Gene 2018 DOI / ARKIV
  • 1
    Ilona Urbarova, Bård Ove Karlsen, Siri Okkenhaug, Ole Morten Seternes, Steinar Johansen, Åse Emblem :
    Digital Marine Bioprospecting: Mining New Neurotoxin Drug Candidates from the Transcriptomes of Cold-Water Sea Anemones
    Marine Drugs 2012 DOI / ARKIV / ARKIV
  • Yi-Qian Sun, Ilona H. Urbarova, Lin Jiang, Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Xiaomei Mai :
    Association between pace of aging estimated from blood DNA methylation and all-cause mortality: The HUNT Study
    01. September 2025 ARKIV
  • Ilona H. Urbarova, Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Anne Heidi Skogholt, Robin Mjelle, Erna-Elise Paulsen, Tom Dønnem et al.:
    Increased Levels of mRNAs and miRNAs Associated with Imminent and Advanced Lung Cancer
    Journal of Thoracic Oncology 2022 DOI / ARKIV
  • Therese Haugdahl Nøst, Ilona Halva Urbarova, Anne Heidi Skogholt, Robin Mjelle, Erna Elise Paulsen, Tom Dønnem et al.:
    Increased levels of mRNAs and miRNAs associated with imminent and advanced lung cancer
    2022 ARKIV
  • Sabin Bhandari, Ruomei Li, Ingelin Kyrrestad, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Ilona Urbarova, Bård Smedsrød et al.:
    Effect of glucocorticoids on liver sinusoidal endothelial cells in vitro
    2019 ARKIV
  • Ilona Urbarova :
    Climate Change Causes Molecular-Level Stress Responses
    Science Trends 2019 ARKIV / FULLTEKST / SAMMENDRAG / OMTALE
  • Ashraful Islam, Vegard Fossum, Ann Kristin Hansen, Ilona Urbarova, Gunnar Knutsen, Inigo Zubiavrre Martinez :
    In vitro chondrogenic potency of surplus chondrocytes from ACI does not predict short-term clinical outcomes.
    2018 ARKIV
  • Ruomei Li, Jaione Simon-Santamaria, Sabin Bhandari, Jack-Ansgar Bruun, Ilona Urbarova, Bård Smedsrød et al.:
    Phenotypic changes in rat liver sinusoidal endothelial cells during early stages of in vitro culture
    2017 ARKIV
  • Ilona Urbarova :
    Exploring genomes and transcriptomes of cold-adapted anthozoans
    2013 ARKIV

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    Teaching

    Since January 2012, I have been involved in teaching several courses, including laboratory courses, at the Faculty of Health Sciences at UiT, both at bachelor and master level. In 2018, I was the course leader for a biotechnology master's course at IMB (MBI-3006), where I also gave several lectures. In addition to my mandatory duties at IMB, I have volunteered at ISM as a group teacher and lecturer for medical (MED-2502) and nutrition students (ERN-3001), PhD fellows (HEL-8013), and served as an internal examiner for bachelor and master theses. I am also a co-supervisor for two PhD fellows at ISM, UiT. To strengthen my pedagogical competence, I am now taking a course in university pedagogical basic competence (Uniped-100) at UiT.

    Researcher profile in Cristin
    ResearchGate
    ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6626-2917

    Member of research group

    Systemepidemiologi   Norsk innhold Systems Epidemiology   English content
    MH øst L11.216


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