Charlotta Rylander is a professor of epidemiology at the Department of Community Medicine, and a member of the Systems epidemiology research group. Charlotta is also serving as the deputy head of research at the department. Her research is mainly in the field of global and environmental health, and cancer epidemiology. 

Charlotta's research interests include:

1.) Lead exposure of children and pregnant women globally. Identification of exposure sources, health effects of exposure, timetrends and surveillance systems for biomonitoring.

2.) Persistent organic pollutants in relation to lifestyle diseases such as type 2 diabetes and obesity. Are elavated POPs in people with the disease a cause or a consequence of the disease?

3.) Life-course changes in body fatness and subsequent cancer risk.

4.) Regsitry-based maternal and child health studies, including quality and validity of registrations.

5.) Environmental impact of food and lifestyle

 PhD student supervision: 

1. 2015-2020: Main supervisor of PhD Marisa da Silva. PhD thesis: Weight change and cancer. The Norwegian Women and Cancer study

2. 2017- 2020: Co-supervisor of PhD Tinatin Manjavidze. PhD thesis: Perinatal mortality and its associationwith antenatal care utilization in the Republic of Georgia

3. 2017-2021: Co-supervisor of PhD Ingvild Hersoug Nedberg. PhD thesis: Cesarean sections in Georgia and Norway - What contributes to too much, too little, or just right? The role of maternal risk factors and efforts to reduce high cesarean section rates

4. 2017-ongoing: Co-supervisor of Natia Skhvitaridze. Topic: Maternal mortality and morbidity in the Republic of Georgia

5. 2017-2023: Main supervisor of PhD Dolley Charles. PhD thesis: Persistent Organic Pollutants and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: Addressing causality with repeated measurements using novel study designs.

6. 2019-2023: Co-supervisor of PhD Giovanni Allaoui. PhD thesis: Blood biomarkers and type 2 diabetes mellitus. Repeated measurements of blood biomarkers in Type 2 diabetes Mellitus cases adn controls; longitudinal assessements and associations

7. 2021- ongoing: Main supervisor of Nia Khachidze. Topic: Teenage pregnancies in the Republic of Georgia

8. 2021- ongoing: Co-supervisor of Ana Aslanikashvili. Topic: Hepatitis C in the Republic of Georgia. 

9. 2021-ongoing: Co-supervisor of Marie Hauan. Topic: Sweet beverage consumption and adverse health outcomes

10. 2022-ongoing: Main supervisor of Marit Busund. Topic: Female sex hormones and molecular subtypes of breast cancer

11. 2022- ongoing: Co-supervisor of Mia Mathisen. Topic: Persistent Organic Pollutants, inflammation markers and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

12. 2022-ongoing: Shared main supervisor of Bahar Kucuk. Topic: In-depth investigation into the environmental sustainability aspects of the northern Norwegian diet:
understanding the sociodemographic associations, co-benefits, and beneficial transformations

13. 2022- ongoing: Co-supervisor of Sophio Sikharulidze, enrolled at the PhD program at University of Georgia. Topic: Lead exposure of pregnant women in Georgia

My research has mainly focussed on nordic diet, particularly in relation to cancer, but also other endpoints. Many of my projects have been based on the Norwegian Women and Cancer (NOWAC) study and various collaborative projects based on this study. The aim is to contribute to evidence based dietary recommendations and preventive/health promotive work centered on a healthy diet. Through the NOWAC study, I participate in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition, a large network trying to find causes of cancer and contribute to cancer prevention.  

In addition to this, I am interested in weight, weight development and dieting, both among children/youth and adults. I have also done som methodological work on dietary assessment methods and food composition databases.

• Biobanking 
• Nutrition

The research of Karina Standahl Olsen focuses on topics like

1) Breast cancer and molecular markers: investigating gene expression profiles and other markers in breast tissue and blood, and their association with breast cancer risk factors and outcomes.
2) Dietary factors and cancer: studying the impact of dietary patterns and nutrient intake on cancer development and progression, with a focus on breast cancer.
3) Blood biomarkers in cancer: analyzing circulating biomarkers and their relationship with various cancer types, including the role of inflammatory biomarkers in cancer risk.
4) Practical aspects of research on biobmarkers in cancer: collating sample collections for systems epidemiology and precision medicine, as well as biobanking practices.
5) Medication use and risk of cancer: modern methodological approaches combined with high-quality cohort and registry data, to address potenial impac of medication use on the risk of cancer (early phase project).

Publications are listed in the Cristin database.

I am an associate professor in Epidemiology at the Department of Community Medicine and the research group leader of the Systems Epidemiology group. I am an associated member of the research group Physical Activity and Public Health. My main research field is within cancer epidemiology and lifestyle factors, especially physical activity and exercise in cancer. A broader focus is also on social inequalities in (public) health and student health and welfare. Lastly, research within pedogogical development with students as partners in designing research based teaching activities. 

Ongoing projects involve: (more information in the research group web site Systems epidemiology)

• Studies on colorectal, pancreatic, and kidney cancers and modifiable lifestyle factors
• Use of a Healthy Lifestyle Index and cancer incidence
• Self-rated health and survival by socioeconomic conditions and modifiable lifestyle factors 
• Body height as a marker of social inequality in health - The Tromsø Study.
• Principal investigator in “Healthy Choices and the Social gradient” Healthy Choices, and Work package (WP6) leader with responsibility for a student health and welfare study and systematical integration of research activities into teaching Students, education and transition phases.
• Potential traumatic events experiences, mental distress in cancer survivors.
• Cancer incidence in Georgia – the Georgian cancer registry. 
• Building Academic Capacity in Global Health in the Eastern Europe-Central Asia Region (BACE) collaboration across Europe and in Georgia, Ukranie and Khasakstan.
• Other projects are projects in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study EPIC

Nutritional epidemiology

Dietary pattern
Regional diets
Sustainable diet
Nordic foods
Food systems
Microbiota
Processed food
The relationship between diet and colorectal cancer
The connection between diet and inflammation

Environmental Epidemiology

• Environmental contatminats and their role in metabolic diseases such as Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus.
• Exposomes and the development and course of lung diseases.

Currently I am focusing on the use of different  “omics” to better study the effects of environmental stressors, as a link between exposure and health endpoints. Right now we are in the preparation of a paper on smoking and DNA methylation in two European Cohorts. We are also planning to combine gene expression data and DNA methylation data in order to improve our understanding of the observed effects and the possible biological understanding.

Before this my research focus the last 10 years has been on environmental contaminants and human health. Through my research I have been trying to merge environmental chemistry and epidemiology, where my students have been involved both in the laboratory and the statistical analysis.

Cross sectional and prospective designs have been utilised at both the smaller community based surveys and larger national as well as international populations based investigations.

Through this unique combination of research fields I have considerable insight into the chemistry of molecules and how contaminants potentially influence human health and at the same time keeping the public health perspective as an important and even essential part of the projects.

My major scientific contribution has been the development and combination of environmental chemistry and human epidemiology into new fields of research that more easily integrates the environmental exposure (both short term and long term) component in larger epidemiological studies. When including “omics” in these projects we are more likely to be able to study causality and not only associations in studies of risk factors and human health. Through the close collaboration with colleagues at the department we have also included the nutritional aspect in studies on diet and contaminants. This has been especially important in our projects on benefits and disadvantages with seafood.

• Epidemiology and prevention of noncommunicable diseases. Lifestyle and social inequalities in non-communicable diseases
• Establish breast cancer as a smoking related cancer. 
• Sex differences in smoking associated cancers.  
• Smoking Cessation and Short- and Longer-Term Mortality 
• Smoking cessation, methods, predictors, and benefits.  
• Smartphones as a tool in Preventive Medicine and in Public Health
• Mammographic density as a surrogate measure for breast cancer and breast cancer prevention 

Research Projects 

Principal investigator and founder  

• 1997-2021 The Tromsø Mammography and Breast Cancer (TMBC) study. TMBC study  
• 2003-2022 Smoking and Cancer Cohort study. Smoking and socio-economy explaining inequalities in cancer incidence and in mortality. Smoking and Cancer
• 2006-2022 Text messaging as support to an internet-based smoking cessation intervention. Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT011030427
• 2016-2022 Developing an Information and Communications Technology solution to obtain annual, national, representative health indicators. 269882/H10

Investigator/collaborator/member

• 1992    The Norwegian Women and Cancer (NOWAC) study. Lead researcher for studies on smoking. 
• 2002    The European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition EPIC                                                  Member lung-, breast-, colorectal-, endometrial-, ovarian and pancreatic cancer WG.
• 2003-2012 The Ethnic and geographic differences in mammographic density and their association                    with Breast cancer incidence (TMBC data ). 
• 2003-2012 The International Collaboration of Epidemiological Studies of Cervical Cancer                                    (The Tromsø Study data )
• 2012 -  The National Cancer Institute Cohort Consortium, with data on smoking and breast cancer                     Smoking and breast cancer /   (NOWAC data)
• 2012 -     The Multiethnic Cohort (MEC) Study. Lead researcher for studies on smoking( MEC data).
• 2014  -    The Richard Doll Epidemiological Studies Consortium  R. Doll consortium (NOWAC data)
• 2015 -     National Institute of Health, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, USA, The                             Ovarian Cancer Cohort Consortium The OC3 study (EPIC data)
• 2015-     The Premenopausal Breast Cancer Collaborative GroupNIH, National Cancer Institute,
• 2020-2024 EU collaboration. “Watching the risk factors: Artificial intelligence and the personalized                       prevention and management of chronic conditions.  WARIFA