Group leader: Anne Tjønneland

Anne Tjønneland has worked at the Danish Cancer Society since 1988 and been head of research in the unit Diet, Genes and Environment since 2011. From 2021, she leads the research group Diet, Cancer and Health.

Her overall main contribution to cancer research and prevention has been the establishment and exploitation of the Diet, Cancer and Health cohort with both national and international collaborations. A personal focus area has been the relationship between alcohol intake and cancer risk as well as the relation between whole grain intake and non-communicable diseases.

In 2013-2018, the DCH cohort was expanded by including children, their spouses, and grandchildren of the original cohort to form a 3-generation family study (‘DCH-Next Generations’ cohort). In doing so, a new unique resource was created that enables trans-generational studies of the pathogenesis of multiple cancers but also other non-communicable diseases in the future.