Unit of Epidemiology

In our strive to advance knowledge of disease patterns and causation we put strong emphasis on the development and application of epidemiological methods. We provide training and research on methodological issues as well as applications of the methods through epidemiological research covering a wide range of health problems. Important research are described below.

Non-ionizing radiation

A longstanding major research area of ours is non-ionizing radiation in relation to cancer and other chronic diseases. While the focus originally was on magnetic fields generated in connection with generation, distribution, and use of electricity, the research is now mainly focused on electromagnetic fields that are used for mobile communication.

Aging

A research program related to the aging population has recently been started. The overarching question is the health of the increasing number of old people in the society. Their health will be of major importance for the impact that the aging population will have on society in terms of retirement age, required resources for health care and supply of work force.

Diabetes

Diabetes may be the worlds fastest growing disease. To prevent a further rise it is important to identify common, modifiable risk factors in the population. Our work primarily aims at identifying risk factors for autoimmune diabetes, an area that is still largely unknown.

Physical activity

Physical activity and effects on health and premature death is another area of continuous interest. The key question is how to separate effects of physical activity from effects of other life style factors that are associated with physical activity including obesity and from genetic factors that simultaneously could affect both the level of physical activity and health.

Brain tumors

Brain tumors accounts for about 2.5 percent of all tumors in Sweden, but is the second most common tumor in children. Little is known about the etiology, and studies of brain tumors are challenging, primarily because of poor prognosis and the effect of the disease on memory. Our research aims at identifying environmental and genetic risk factors for brain tumors using different study designs.

Head of Unit