# The Early Life Exposome and Childhood Health - The Colorado Healthy Start 3 Cohort Study

> **NIH NIH UH3** · UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO DENVER · 2022 · $2,462,168

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
In response to RFA-OD-16-004, our overarching goal is to determine the early life “exposome”,
across a wide range of exposures (social, lifestyle, nutritional, chemical, physical), and conduct
integrative analyses with child health outcomes that are informed by biological pathways and
account for postnatal factors. We propose to leverage an existing, ongoing pre-birth cohort in
Colorado, Healthy Start, which has recruited and is currently following 1410 mother-child dyads
up to age 4-5 years (R01DK076648, PI Dabelea). Biological samples have been collected
during pregnancy, at birth, and are now being obtained at age 4-5 years. Our study proposes to
leverage this cohort by accomplishing the following aims:
AIM 1: Expand the assessment of prenatal and early life environmental exposures (air pollution,
built environment) and add to exposures already measured (social, lifestyle, nutritional,
chemical) to define exposure patterns (external domain of the exposome);
AIM 2: Measure biological signatures (internal domain of the exposome) associated with
prenatal environmental exposures in subsets of children with available samples (cord blood,
umbilical-derived mesenchymal stem cells, and placentas);
AIM 3: Continue the longitudinal follow up of the cohort to age 7-8 years focusing on obesity,
vascular, metabolic, neurocognitive and respiratory outcomes, as well as postnatal social and
behavioral factors;
AIM4: Conduct integrative analyses to assess the relationships of multiple and combined early
life exposures with child outcomes. Biological, social and behavioral pathways and mediators
will be explored.
Our study is poised to integrate estimates of already available and newly measured
environmental exposures operating during prenatal/early life, together with their biological
signatures and likely effects on developmental behaviors, to provide a first step in the much
needed holistic understanding of the etiology of childhood chronic diseases. By continuing to
longitudinally follow up the Colorado Healthy Start cohort and collaborating with the larger
ECHO consortium we will be able to expand the scope of our work, by refining and incorporating
additional components of the exposome, exploring changes in the composition and impact of
the exposome over time, targeting additional childhood outcomes, and participating in large
gene-environment interaction studies.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10474594
- **Project number:** 5UH3OD023248-07
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO DENVER
- **Principal Investigator:** Dana Dabelea
- **Activity code:** UH3 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $2,462,168
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2016-09-21 → 2023-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10474594

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10474594, The Early Life Exposome and Childhood Health - The Colorado Healthy Start 3 Cohort Study (5UH3OD023248-07). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10474594. Licensed CC0.

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