Abstract
At the dawn of the new millennium, the birth of attosecond metrology enabled us to capture sub-atomic motions for the first time. When triggered and captured in the molecules of human blood, these motions may reveal changes in the sample's molecular composition and provide early signs of unfolding health aberrations. Thanks to a unique large-scale repeated-baseline, high-frequency-follow-up longitudinal cohort study, the H4H study in Hungary (h4h.hu), we have now gained first evidence for the capacity of the approach to deliver signals of unfolding chronic conditions several years before they become symptomatic and are clinically diagnosed. These results open, for the first time, the prospect for cost-effective monitoring of human health.
My global initiative “protecting.health” aims at realizing a network of standardized studies based on the H4H study concept – initially in Hungary, Hong Kong, and Germany – for establishing individualized reference ranges of blood parameters for tens of thousands of participants and tracking their temporal evolution over 10 years. The resultant >500.000 blood samples along with their multi-modal (infrared fingerprinting and mass spectrometric) molecular profiling hold promise for the development of the world's first screening algorithm for the early detection of prevalent non-communicable diseases such as cardiovascular diseases, cancer, diabetes and COPD.
I will also announce – for the first time at this meeting – plans for extending the protecting.health network to Africa, upon initiative of Prof. John Amuasi, who will be our special guest at the meeting. We shall be happy to jointly discuss about the impact of this global endeavour for Africa and the rest of the world in my Nobel Hour at 15:30 on Monday.
