Public Health

Dr. Zhang has been working toward applying FISH to understand the mechanisms of bone marrow toxicity caused by benzene and as a biomarker for childhood leukeumia and other types of cancer. Recently, her research interest has turned to toxicogenomics, leading research efforts to apply gene expression profiling in molecular epidemiology and RNAi in human cell culture studies of chemical exposure.

Research in Dr. M.T. Smith's laboratory is focused on the development of biomarkers for susceptibility and early effect and their application to the study of human populations exposed to various chemicals. Recent studies involve the application of biomarkers among people exposed to arsenic, benzene, butadiene and malathion.

His research work focuses on environmental and health issues in developing countries, particularly those related to health-damaging and climate-changing air pollution, and includes ongoing field projects in India, China, Nepal, Mexico, and Guatemala.

Dr. Nicas has two primary research interests. First, he develops mathematical models to estimate exposure intensity to airborne chemical toxicants. Such models consider the pollutant emission rate and the dispersion pattern in air. Dr. Nicas uses two approaches - a traditional method based on deterministic differential equations and a probabilistic method involving Markov chain techniques. Second, he develops probability models for infection by airborne pathogens (e.g., M. tuberculosis, Y. pestis, C. immitis), with an immediate application to the risk-based selection of personal respiratory protection.

Dr. McKone's research interests include the use of multimedia compartment models in health-risk assessments; chemical transport and transformation in the environment; and measuring and modeling the biophysics of contaminant transport from the environment into the microenvironments with which humans have contact and across the human/environment exchange boundaries--skin, lungs, and gut.

Spatial analysis of disease-exposure associations using Geographic Information Science; geographic exposure modeling, land use characterization.

Health policy as it is shaped by housing, transportation, agricultural, environmental, economic policy. Specific effects of toxic chemicals on health, especially that of children. Biomonitoring of chemical body burdens and health. Pesticides and human health.

The main focus of her research in the last several years is on biomarker studies in Children's Environmental Health. Dr. Holland organized scientific sessions on Children's Environmental Health at the International Conference on Mutagens in Human Populations in Brazil, 2003 at the EMS meeting in Miami, 2003, and at 9h ICEM meeting in San Francisco, 2005.

Dr. Balmes' laboratory, the Human Exposure Laboratory (HEL), has been studying the respiratory health effects of various air pollutants for the past 15 years. Recently, the HEL has been focusing on the airway inflammatory effects of ozone and fine particles.

Dr. Hammond's early work focused on the pulmonary effects of exposures to silicon carbide in manufacturing, the carcinogenic potential of diesel exhaust exposures in railroad workers, the effects of exposure to solvents among boat builders, and the effect of exposure to machining fluids in the automobile industry. One of her continuing interests has been that of quantifying exposures to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS).