UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL

Bristol is one of the most popular and successful universities in the UK and was ranked within the top 10 in the world in the QS World University Rankings 2024, and is the top 5 UK university for research quality in the Times Higher Education REF 2021 quality ratings. The MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit (MRC IEU) at the university conducts some of the UK’s most advanced population health science research.

The MRC IEU uses genetics, population data and experimental interventions to look for the underlying causes of chronic disease. MRC IEU exploits the latest advances in genetic and epigenetic technologies, developing new analysis methods to improve understanding of how our family background, behaviours and genes work together. It uses these to investigate how people develop and remain healthy or become ill.

The MRC IEU also hosts the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), also known as the Children of the 90s, which is the most detailed study of its kind in the world.

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Dr. Ana
Goncalves
Soares
Research Fellow in Epidemiology
Ana is a Research Fellow in Epidemiology at the University of Bristol. Her research delves into the impact of exposures from early life onwards on health outcomes across the lifespan, with a focus on cardiometabolic, reproductive, and mental health outcomes. Employing various statistical and epidemiological methods, her work aims to elucidate the timing, magnitude, and mechanisms through which adverse exposures influence later-life health outcomes. Ana’s interests encompass trajectories of cardiometabolic health over time, causal mediation analysis, environmental epidemiology, and the synthesis of evidence to enhance causal inference.
Prof.
Nicholas
Timpson
Professor of Genetic Epidemiology
Nic’s research centres on employing genetic epidemiology to unravel potentially causal relationships between modifiable risk factors and complex health outcomes, with a specific emphasis on investigating body mass index (BMI) as a risk factor. Utilizing a diverse array of study designs and molecular phenotyping techniques, he explores pathways to disease and intervention effects. Nic spearheads initiatives applying these methodologies to inquiries concerning the origins of cancer, cardiovascular health, and the influence of the environment on cardiometabolic health. As the Principal Investigator of ALSPAC, he has assumed an increasingly active role in strategically leveraging population-based resources to tackle population health challenges in a coordinated fashion.
Dr.
Gemma
Clayton
Research Fellow in Health Data Science
After completing an MSci in Mathematics at the University of Birmingham, she pursued her interest in statistics and its real-world applications by undertaking an MSc in Medical Statistics at the University of Leicester. Following two years of experience as a Medical Statistician at the Bristol Clinical Trials Unit, she embarked on a PhD in clinical trials methodology within the Population Health Sciences department at the University of Bristol. Her research focuses on applying statistical and epidemiological methods to assess the impact of women’s reproductive health on cardiovascular risk. She is particularly intrigued by (i) the trajectories of cardiovascular risk factors over time and the influence of specific characteristics on these trajectories, and (ii) the advocacy of multiple study designs and methods, each with distinct sources of bias (triangulation), to enable potential causal inferences.

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