24 Mar 2021 | 20.00 - 21.30YouTube Livestream
The food we eat, the air we breathe, and the stress we experience. On March 24th epidemiologist Dr Virissa Lenters explains how the exposome influences our health in a lecture of Studium Generale.
It’s safe to say that, in general, we live longer than ever before. We’ve eradicated some deadly infectious diseases and improved our hygiene and nutrition. But are we also living healthier? What makes us sick in the 21st century? These are the questions that epidemiologist Virissa Lenters (UU) tries to answer by decoding the exposome. It is a relatively new concept aimed at explaining what humans are exposed to in life, from birth to death. The food we ingest, the air we breathe, the objects we touch and the psychological stress we encounter. How do these exposures influence our genetics? How does this exposome research break with the traditional approach of cause and effect in health studies?
The environment we live in has a dominant impact on our health. It explains an estimated seventy percent of the chronic disease burden. Where we live, what we eat, how much we exercise, the air we breathe and whom we associate with; all of these environmental factors play a role. The combination of these factors over the life course is called the exposome. There is general (scientific) consensus that understanding more about the exposome will help explain the current burden of disease and that it provides entry points for prevention and ...
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