Exposome Perspectives
A blog by Robert O. Wright, MD, MPH
Dr. Robert Wright is a pediatrician, medical toxicologist, and environmental epidemiologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. He is the Ethel H. Wise Chair of the Department of Environmental Medicine and Public Health, Co-Director of the Institute for Exposomic Research, and Principal Investigator of an ongoing longitudinal birth cohort in Mexico City (Programming Research in Obesity, Growth, Environment and Social Stress–PROGRESS) in collaboration with the National Institute of Public Health, Mexico. He also founded the MATCH (Metals Assessment Targeting Community Health) study in Tar Creek, Oklahoma.
On his blog he provides a unique, eye-level, perspective into the worlds of environmental health research, precision medicine, and the role of exposomics in understanding, preventing and treating disease.
I forgot to remember to forget (Elvis Presley by way of Stan Kesler and Charlie Feathers)
Researchers place a high value on memory, and without memory how could we function, how could we learn, how could we even find our way home? We judge someone with a good memory to be fortunate and seldom consider any downsides to remembering.
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One-hit Wonders and the Exposome of Exposure Probability
“Begin at the beginning,” the King said, very gravely, “and go on till you come to the end.” Lewis Carroll
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The Human Exposome Map: Making Order Out of Chaos
“Begin at the beginning,” the King said, very gravely, “and go on till you come to the end.” Lewis Carroll
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Exposomics: The Final Frontier
“Things are only impossible until they’re not.”- Captain Jean-Luc Picard
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Memory and the Exposome of Love
Understanding how our social environment impacts our health is key to unlocking effective interventions that promote health and well-being. Let’s think about this in the context of what gives us joy in life: love, music, and happy memories.
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The Language of Science and the Science of Language: Unseen Barriers in Research
The events that set climate change in motion occurred decades ago. How do we analyze the past and factor in the variable of chance when trying to predict future climate and weather events?
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Climate Change Predictions: Butterflies, Monty Hall, and Chaos
The events that set climate change in motion occurred decades ago. How do we analyze the past and factor in the variable of chance when trying to predict future climate and weather events?
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A Son’s Reflection on His Mother’s Life Journey
Dr. Robert Wright reflects on the life of his mother—Naoko Yogi Wright, a woman who grew up in extreme poverty, survived war and moved half-way across the globe to a foreign culture in hope of giving opportunity to her children, all the while continuing to contribute to the lives of the family she left behind in Okinawa.
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Discovery Research vs Hypothesis Testing: Sherlock Holmes, Colonel Mustard, and “How Exposomics Learned the Trick” (Part II)
By taking what we’ve learned about discovery research and hypothesis testing, Dr. Robert Wright explains how we can grapple with the millions of factors that make up our environment and the different ways they affect our health.
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Discovery Research vs Hypothesis Testing: Sherlock Holmes, Colonel Mustard, and “How Exposomics Learned the Trick” (Part I)
With the help of Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective and the board game Clue, Dr. Robert Wright explains the differences between exposomics and traditional environmental health research – and the importance of integrating them
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Nature vs Nurture – On the Origins of a Specious Argument
Can a health condition or a disease be 80% genetic and 20% environmental? Can we reimagine how we understand the origins of disease?
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The Aleph and Systems Biology
Is it possible that your risk for disease was set when you were a baby? Evidence shows that our earliest years of life are perhaps the most important for understanding the origins of many health outcomes.
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Reflections on the 20th Commemoration of September 11
We owe an extraordinary debt to the heroes of September 11, and to their brothers and sisters who survived that day but still bear the physical and mental health effects, as well as the scars and wounds of sorrow and loss. The World Trade Center Health Program is part of how we honor that debt.
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The “Fetal Origins” of Adult Disease
Is it possible that your risk for disease was set when you were a baby? Evidence shows that our earliest years of life are perhaps the most important for understanding the origins of many health outcomes.
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