PhD Defense: Empowering Epidemiology with Life-Based Ethics; A Study of the Exposome and Exposomics

Scientists are investigating how the environment as a whole influences human health. This emerging field of research is known as exposomics.

This dissertation examines exposomics from an ethical perspective and argues that it can be empowered through an ethical theory grounded in life. On the basis of a literature review and focus groups, it attempts to identify and subsequently evaluate the overarching values and assumptions of exposomics. Its findings show that the nature-nurture debate should be removed from exposomics and replaced with a proper understanding of human agency and the capacity to act on information.

Additionally, it demonstrates that exposomics requires a clear definition, which would provide direction for the field and further enable scientific and technological progress that can improve human wellbeing. Exposomics should be defined a research program in environmental health aimed at enabling a comprehensive and discovery-driven approach to identifying environmental determinants of human health.