MRC Epidemiology Unit

General information

Obesity, type 2 diabetes and related metabolic disorders present a major public health and research challenge. The number of people developing these disorders is increasing, and they result from the complex interplay of genetic and environmental factors that operate throughout life.

The MRC Epidemiology Unit studies these factors, and the outcomes from these studies are used to develop strategies for the prevention of these diseases in the general population.

We are a Medical Research Council Unit embedded as a department of the University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine.

The Unit is affiliated with two research Institutes, reflecting our connections with basic science, clinical medicine and public health.

The Unit is part of the Wellcome Trust – MRC Institute of Metabolic Science (IMS) on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, where the principal offices and laboratories of the Unit are physically located. Unit Director Professor Nick Wareham is Co-Director of the IMS with Professor Sir Stephen O’Rahilly. Being embedded in the IMS is critical to our aspiration to examine associations between potential exposures and metabolic disease outcome, and to follow up these observations to determine possible causality and mechanisms.

The Unit is also a part of the Cambridge Institute of Public Health (CIPH). We closely collaborate with a number of departments within the CIPH, and many of our studies are run jointly with Institute colleagues. The CIPH acts as a route to a wide range of other multidisciplinary collaborations that aid the translation of epidemiological observations into public health action. The Institute also plays an important role in our teaching and training programme: our students usually undertake the Masters in Epidemiology or that in Public Health run by the Department of Public Health and Primary Care, to which our staff contribute as supervisors and lecturers.