LongITools: understanding the interplay between the environment and our health

CyNexo  is partner in LongITools, a new European research project studying the interactions between the environment, lifestyle and health in determining the risks of chronic cardiovascular and metabolic disease.
Led by the University of Oulu in Finland, the consortium’s research  will build on life-course data from 11 million European citizens to study cardio-metabolic health trajectories from birth to old age.
CyNexo take  part as one of three SMEs in the recently launched LongITools European research project, which is a five-year project with a total grant of €11,997,448 from the EU’s Horizon 2020 R&D programme, and one of nine projects in the newly created ‘European Human Exposome Network’.

Lifestyle and living environments have changed. Environmental exposures, including air and noise pollution, the built environment and an individual’s psychological, social and lifestyle determinants, interplay with genetic factors leading to increasing the risk of developing cardiovascular and metabolic non-communicable diseases, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart diseases and atherosclerosis. The LongITools project will study and measure how longitudinal exposure to these environmental factors contribute to the risk of developing such diseases across the life-course. The project will take an exposome or holistic-based approach, linking individual and societal health to the environment to define the disease pathways and the points at which to best intervene during the life-course to reduce the risks.

This ambitious project includes partners from 15 research institutions and 3 small and medium-sized enterprises, including CyNexo, across eight European countries with expertise in epidemiology, genetics, epigenetics, metabolomics, lifestyle, mathematics, economics, policy making and sensor technology.

The project is also one of nine projects in the newly created ‘European Human Exposome Network’.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 874739.

For CyNexo it is a great pleasure to take part as one of the three SMEs in the European research project LongITools and a great honor to be part of such a knowledgeable and inspiring group. In collaboration with Ab.Acus and University Pompeu Fabra we will develop innovative wearable health devices for sensing physiological and environmental parameters as well as work on the integration of wearable and sensor data.

Work within the LongITools group is now entering the core of the scientific discussion.

Partners:

  • University of Oulu, Finland (Project Coordinator)
  • Ab.Acus, Italy
  • Academic Medical Center, Netherlands
  • Beta Technology Ltd, UK
  • Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden
  • CyNexo, Italy
  • Erasmus Medical Center, Netherlands
  • Imperial College London, UK
  • National Institute for Health and Medical Research (INSERM), France
  • University College London, UK
  • University Medical Center Groningen, Netherlands
  • University of Barcelona, Spain
  • University of Bristol, UK
  • University of Eastern Finland, Finland
  • University of Oslo, Norway
  • University of Rome Tor Vergata, Italy
  • University of Surrey, UK
  • University of Utrecht, Netherlands.

LongITools
Valorisation and Innovation