Title: The Blood Exposome and its Role in Discovering Causes of Disease
Speaker: Stephen M. Rappaport, PhD
Professor of Environmental Health, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley
Short Bio:
Prof. Rappaport is a pioneer in the emerging field of ‘Exposure Biology’ and a prominent advocate of the concept of the ‘Exposome’ as a new paradigm for environmental health. His laboratory is conducting Exposome Wide Association Studies (EWAS) to discover causes of cancer and other chronic diseases. By profiling thousands of small molecules and protein adducts in archived blood from incident cases and controls, they are finding discriminating chemicals that point to potentially causal exposures. During his career, Prof. Rappaport has used environmental measurements and biomarkers to elucidate the human metabolism of several toxic chemicals, notably benzene, and to quantify interindividual variability in biomarker levels due to genetic, environmental and lifestyle factors.
Abstract:
While many researchers examine the genome to discover the causes of complex diseases, evidence points towards the exposome - the totality of exposures received by an individual - as being the primary cause of chronic diseases. Since exposures are inherently chemical in nature and arise from varied sources – endogenous processes, foods, drugs, pollutants and human and microbiota metabolism – untargeted analysis of chemicals in human blood can be used to characterize exposomes. Causal exposures can be pinpointed by conducting exposome-wide association studies (EWAS) that compare blood concentrations of scores of chemicals between disease cases and controls.
Date: May 18th, 2017
Time: 12:00-1:00pm
Location: CAM Building, 17 East 102nd Street, West Tower Elevator, 5th Floor, D5-122
If you need more information please contact:
*Light lunch will be provided
