Genes, Environment and Health Initiative invests in genetic studies, environmental monitoring
Sep 4, 2007 - 4:00:00 AM
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The principal investigators, approximate funding levels and health condition to be focused on are:
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By NIH/National Human Genome Research Institute,
[RxPG] The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has selected the first projects to be funded as part of the Genes, Environment and Health Initiative (GEI), a unique collaboration between geneticists and environmental scientists.
This is ground-breaking research in understanding the complex factors that contribute to health and disease, said Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt. Researchers have long known that our genes, our environmental exposures and our own behavioral choices all have an influence on our health. This new initiative will use innovative genomic tools as well as new instruments for measuring environmental factors � from diet and physical activity to stress and substance addiction � in order to begin sorting out how these different factors affect a person�s risk for a number of health conditions.
Secretary Leavitt first launched the GEI initiative in February 2006 as a proposal in the President's budget for fiscal year 2007. The funding announced today is for the first research grants under the new initiative. They are part of a broader effort across HHS agencies to build on recent advances in genomic science and medicine, including the Secretary's Initiative on Personalized Health Care. NIH received $40 million in new funding as part of its fiscal year (FY) 2007 budget to support GEI. NIH institutes already planned to spend some $28 million in FY 2007 on the kinds of studies GEI will conduct. And finally, two institutes chose to add a total of $9 million in additional funding for targeted studies under the Genes, Environment and Health Initiative.
To identify the genetic risks, researchers will use the rapidly evolving technologies used in genome-wide association studies to focus on common conditions, such as tooth decay, heart disease, cancer and diabetes. This genetic component of GEI uses a strategy which relies on the newfound ability to swiftly identify genetic differences throughout the genome between people with an illness and those who are healthy, leading to an understanding of the underlying genetic contribution to the disease. The environmental component will begin by developing new technologies that accurately measure personal exposures with small, wearable sensors that can be used to assess environmental agents. The final component of the research strategy is to determine whether the effect of genetic variants that increase disease risk is different in the presence of environmental exposures. In the first year, NIH will fund eight genome-wide association studies, two genotyping centers, a coordinating center and more than 30 environmental technology projects.
�Genome-wide association studies have proven themselves to be powerful tools for discovering the genetic contributions to common diseases,� said Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D., director of the NIH, which is part of HHS. �Early findings from such studies have identified new genetic variants associated with a higher risk of common diseases such as prostate cancer, diabetes and heart disease, but researchers have only scratched the surface. The genetic studies being funded today will identify many novel genetic variants associated with an increased risk for these health conditions.�
The genome-wide association studies will be led by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of NIH. First-year funding for the studies was contributed by all NIH institutes and centers, including an extra investment by NIH�s National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR).
The principal investigators, approximate funding levels and health condition to be focused on are:
Terri Beaty, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore
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