How neighborhood conditions, smoking, and gene changes affect lung cancer risk
Understanding the role of area-level factors, smoking, and epigenetics in lung cancer risk across populations groups
This project looks at how where you live, lifetime smoking, and chemical changes to your genes may together influence lung cancer risk for adults from different racial and ethnic groups.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | University of California, San Francisco NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (San Francisco, United States) |
| Project ID | NIH-11111445 on NIH RePORTER |
What this research studies
If you're part of the cohorts, researchers will combine your smoking history, blood-based epigenetic markers, and neighborhood information (housing, poverty, tobacco retailers, and access to care) to study lung cancer risk. They will use data from two large U.S. cohort studies that include over 272,000 adults with up to 27 years of follow-up and cancer registry information. Addresses will be linked to area-level measures while lab tests on stored samples will measure molecular markers related to smoking and epigenetic changes. The team will compare patterns across racial and ethnic groups to better understand why some groups have higher lung cancer risk for the same smoking exposure.
Who could benefit from this research
Good fit: Adults (21+) from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds, especially those with a history of smoking and who are enrolled in the Multiethnic Cohort or Southern Community Cohort, are the main focus of this work.
Not a fit: People under 21, those not represented in the cohorts, or those without smoking or neighborhood data are unlikely to benefit directly from this specific project.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this work could point to community and biological reasons for higher lung cancer rates and help target prevention, screening, and resources to groups and neighborhoods at higher risk.
How similar studies have performed: Previous research has linked smoking biomarkers and epigenetic changes to lung cancer, but combining those biological measures with neighborhood-level factors across multiple racial and ethnic groups is relatively new.
Where this research is happening
San Francisco, United States
- University of California, San Francisco — San Francisco, United States (Active)
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Cheng, Iona C — University of California, San Francisco
- Study coordinator: Cheng, Iona C
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page below.