The Exposome

What is the human exposome?

The human exposome encompasses exposures to environmental factors throughout life, starting from conception and pregnancy. It refers to the totality of environmental exposures over a lifetime.

Environmental exposures are diverse and interact with each other. These exposures can include pollution, infections, chemicals, diet, urban, blue and green environments, socioeconomic factors and lifestyle. All of these factors can impact our health and wellbeing and the risk of developing various diseases.

The exposome approach to research is more holistic, exploring multiple environmental factors affecting health. This moves away from studying using the more traditional ‘one exposure, one disease’ approach.

Watch our video to understand more about the exposome in relation to the LongITools project.