Partner 09: Utrecht University

Partner description

Utrecht University (UU) is the largest university in the Netherlands, employing 3600 scientists and 3300 support staff. The Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences (IRAS) at UU is a partnership between the faculties of Medicine, Veterinary medicine, and Science; about 130 staff members, including some 50 PhD fellows, engage in education and research in environmental epidemiology, toxicology and veterinary public health. IRAS has a strong reputation for producing world class research in environmental exposure science and health.

Website: www.uu.nl

Role in the project

UU is a partner in the project and will lead WP5 – on health impact and risk assessment, focus on animal and human aspect. UU will also contribute significantly to WPs 3, leading tasks 3.3 and 3.5 on complement existing exposure data with CSS data to improve models on exposure for animals and human, and provide exposure estimates for different farming systems, respectively. In addition, UU will contribute to tasks 3.1, 3.2 & 3.4 on data mining, exposure datasets for ecosystem and plants, and validation of exposure estimates, respectively.

Involved personnel

09 Vermeulen

Prof. Dr. Vermeulen is a Professor of Environmental Epidemiology and Exposome Science. His scientific research focuses on environmental risk factors for non-communicable diseases with a strong emphasis on integrating epidemiology, high quality exposure assessment, and molecular biology into multidisciplinary investigations. He is the director of the Utrecht Exposome Hub and PI of several casecontrol and prospective studies in occupational settings and the general population. He lead the Dutch OBO project (research into pesticide exposure from residents, as well as evaluating health effects from pesticide exposures). He has a leading role in many European collaborative projects in the area of environmental health. Prof Vermeulen has served on many international committees including the WHO and the US NTP program. He is a member of the Dutch Health council, elected chair of the International Commission on Occupational Health (ICOH), and Scientific Committee on Epidemiology in Occupational Health (EPICOH).

09 Huss

Dr. Huss is assistant professor trained in geography and epidemiology. She has been PI and senior scientist in a large number of European Union (EU) and Dutch funded studies in the field of environmental health (GERONIMO, MOBIKIDS). She was involved in previous Dutch studies on retrospective pesticide exposure assessment and Parkinsons Disease (PAGES) and OBO (research into pesticide exposure from residents, as well as evaluating health effects from pesticide exposures. She is co-PI of the Dutch LIFEWORK cohort and serves as a member of the Dutch Health council and several other expert committees.

Silhouet Eng. Figueiredo is a researcher trained in environmental sciences, epidemiology, toxicology and environmental health. He has been involved in different modelling efforts on several projects, involving both fate of chemicals in the environment and exposure of humans to these. More recently, he was involved in the OBO (research into pesticide exposure from residents) where he was heavily responsible for both the data analysis and the modelling efforts