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Introduction to Environment and Exposome-Wide Association Studies: A Data-Driven Method to Identify Multiple Environmental Factors Associated with Phenotypes in Human Populations

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Chemical Mixtures and Combined Chemical and Nonchemical Stressors

Abstract

It is a priority to identify multiple environmental factors, or mixtures, associated with disease phenotypes in human populations. However, high-throughput computational methods to identify mixtures that are important in human disease are lacking. This chapter describes the “environment-wide association study” (EWAS) analytic approach to identify a number of environmental exposures in human disease. With the advent of high-throughput environmental exposure information (e.g., exposome), methods such as EWAS will be instrumental to accelerate discovery in disease.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Chirag J. Patel

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  1. National Toxicology Program, National Institute of Environmental, Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA

    Cynthia V. Rider

  2. National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory, Office of Research and Development, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA

    Jane Ellen Simmons

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Patel, C.J. (2018). Introduction to Environment and Exposome-Wide Association Studies: A Data-Driven Method to Identify Multiple Environmental Factors Associated with Phenotypes in Human Populations. In: Rider, C., Simmons, J. (eds) Chemical Mixtures and Combined Chemical and Nonchemical Stressors. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-56234-6_5

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