New world-class biomedical research unit to be launched
27 May 2011
The Medical Research Council (MRC) Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit (LEU) at the University of Southampton, previously known as the MRC Epidemiology Resource Centre (ERC) in Southampton, is to be formally renamed at a special ceremony next week.
Sir John Savill, MRC chief executive, will officially rename the unit, which specialises in investigating cardiovascular, musculoskeletal and metabolic disease throughout the lifecourse, at a special open day for local and national partners on Thursday 2nd June 2011. Also in attendance will be Dr Alan Whitehead MP and Professor Don Nutbeam, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Southampton.
The name change reflects the unit’s major achievements in lifecourse epidemiology and its international standing as a strategic research leader in the field. It was announced by the MRC following a successful five-year review of the ERC. The unit also received funding of £14m over the next five years to continue and expand its work.
Professor Cyrus Cooper, director of the LEU, said:
“We are greatly looking forward to our formal opening. The integrated research programmes we run, which address the lifecourse determinants of chronic musculoskeletal and metabolic disorders, provide an ideal basis for a strategically integrated and focussed MRC Unit. I am delighted.”
The ERC was established in 2003 under the direction of Professor Cooper, itself a successor to the MRC Environmental Epidemiology Unit which represented a continuing intramural MRC investment in Southampton since 1979. The core aim of the LEU is to discover and understand the preventable causes of common chronic musculoskeletal disorders such as osteoporosis, osteoarthritis and sarcopenia; and metabolic disorders like obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Scientists at the unit, based principally at the University of Southampton but with an emergent programme at the University of Oxford, study the interplay of causes acting at different stages of the lifecourse. Through an understanding of the processes at work, from before conception through to old age, population-based and high-risk preventive strategies can be developed against certain common, chronic diseases of later life. These strategies inform health policy.
Professor Cooper said:
“Our research discoveries include documentation of the developmental influences which contribute to the risk of osteoporosis and hip fracture in late adulthood; and the demonstration that maternal vitamin D insufficiency is associated with sub-optimal bone mineral accrual in childhood.”
The LEU will continue to maintain an internationally renowned collection of cohort studies which explore the developmental origins of health and disease; including the Hertfordshire Cohort Study and the Southampton Women’s Survey.
