Am J Epidemiol. 2016 Mar 1;183(5):387-93. doi: 10.1093/aje/kww001. Epub 2016 Feb 22.
Genetic epidemiology represents a hybrid of epidemiologic designs and statistical models that explicitly consider both genetic and environmental risk factors for disease. It is a relatively new field in public health; the term was first coined only 35 years ago. In this short time, the field has been through a major evolution, changing from a field driven by theory, without the technology for genetic measurement or computational capacity to apply much of the designs and methods developed, to a field driven by rapidly expanding technology in genomic measurement and computational analyses while epidemiologic theory struggles to keep up. In this commentary, we describe 4 different eras of genetic epidemiology, spanning this evolution from theory to technology, what we have learned, what we have added to the broader field of public health, and what remains to be done.
遗传流行病学是流行病学设计和统计模型的结合，它明确考虑了疾病的遗传和环境风险因素。它是公共卫生领域的一个相对较新的领域；这个术语仅在 35 年前才首次提出。在这短短的时间里，该领域经历了重大的演变，从一个由理论驱动、没有遗传测量技术或计算能力来应用大部分已开发的设计和方法的领域，演变为一个由基因组测量和计算分析的快速扩展技术驱动的领域，而流行病学理论努力跟上。在这篇评论中，我们描述了遗传流行病学的 4 个不同时代，涵盖了从理论到技术的演变，我们学到了什么，我们为更广泛的公共卫生领域增添了什么，以及还有什么有待完成。
