Researchers at the MRC Epidemiology Unit are among scientists from across the world contributing to The Lancet 2021 series on physical activity. Key findings revealed in the series include: Worldwide progress to improve physical activity has stalled; overall deaths associated with inactivity remain at more than 5 million people per year. No progress has been […]

Researchers from CEDAR at the MRC Epidemiology Unit have, for the third year in a row, contributed to the Food Foundation’s annual Broken Plate report. Each year the report tracks progress against 10 metrics that illustrate the health of our food system. This year’s report demonstrates that the food environment is skewed towards less healthy […]

Scientists at the University of Cambridge have identified rare genetic variants – carried by one in 3,000 people – that have a larger impact on the risk of developing type 2 diabetes than any previously identified genetic effect. Type 2 diabetes is thought to be driven in part by inherited genetic factors, but many of […]

The MRC Epidemiology Unit is participating in the Health Data Research UK (HDR UK) Black internship programme, and this week we welcomed our first intern, Elizabeth Oduala, to the Unit. Elizabeth is doing a degree in Applied AI & Data Analytics at the University of Bradford, and during her internship Elizabeth will work under the supervision of  Dr SM […]

An international research team, led by Professor Melinda Mills and colleagues at the University of Oxford and MRC Epidemiology Unit scientist Dr Felix Day, has discovered hundreds of genetic markers driving two of life’s most momentous milestones – the age at when people first have sex and become parents. In an analysis of data from […]

We are delighted to have been awarded the Green Impact Platinum Award in 2020-21, the first time that the Unit has achieved this award. Congratulations to our Green Impact Group for the hard work they put in towards this award, and to all Unit members who contributed to this achievement. With the award we received […]

By including multi-ethnic participants, a largescale genetic study has identified more regions of the genome linked to type 2 diabetes-related traits than if the research had been conducted in Europeans alone. The international MAGIC collaboration, made up of more than 400 global academics conducted a genome-wide association meta-analysis led by the University of Exeter. In […]

An international collaboration, led by researchers at the Nuffield Department of Population Health at the University of Oxford, including Professor Martin White of the MRC Epidemiology Unit, has calculated that approximately one million excess deaths occurred in 2020 across 29 high income countries. The results are published today in the BMJ. Assessing the coronavirus pandemic’s […]

In many countries, including the UK, many fewer women than men cycle. Using data from 17 countries in six continents, a new study led by researchers at the MRC Epidemiology Unit, University of Cambridge has identified a threshold above which we start to see at least as many women cycling as men. For countries this […]

MRC Epidemiology Unit PhD students and scientists took part in the inaugural Cambridge Festival, held online due to the Covid pandemic. The Cambridge Festival spanned the humanities and sciences, and featured over 350 free virtual events from Friday 26 March to Sunday 4 April. Involving people in research during the Covid-19 pandemic On Tuesday 30 […]