Aging is one of the major challenges of the 21st century that touches every aspect of society, and has a significant impact on the current health care systems. Healthy aging is defined as developing & maintaining the functional ability that enables wellbeing in older age. One of the most important predictors of healthy aging is good lung functional ability. To correctly interpret lung function data and understand trajectories leading to lung disease, it is crucial to study lung health in observational cohorts including populations representative for today’s society and exposed to today’s environment.
We propose the first large-scale Belgian population-based cohort study on 10,000 citizens aiming to explore the impact of contemporary exposome on lung health. Participants aged >45 years will be recruited from 2 well-defined districts in the city of Ghent. Lung function parameters will be measured by spirometry and the dietary metabolome will be investigated with state-of-the-art analytical techniques with focus on antioxidants and mycotoxins. 
Subgroup analysis will identify participants at increased risk of lung impairment upon environmental exposures. Overall, this project aims to increase our understanding of the impact of dietary markers on lung health and identify groups at potential increased risk for lung disease.