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National Studies on Air Pollution and Health

The National Studies on Air Pollution and Health (NSAPH) harnesses the power of data science to understand emerging threats, develop innovative solutions, and promote evidence-based policies at the intersection of climate change, air pollution, and human health.

Location

677 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115

Who Are We and What Do We Do

The National Studies on Air Pollution and Health (NSAPH) harnesses the power of data science to understand emerging threats, develop innovative solutions, and promote evidence-based policies at the intersection of climate change, air pollution, and human health.

Based at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, NSAPH is made up of faculty, research scientists, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate and undergraduate students from institutions worldwide. NSAPH works collaboratively across disciplines to conduct cutting-edge research in pursuit of a more sustainable, more equitable, and healthier future for all.

NSAPH research includes statistical methodology; causal inference; machine learning; measures of the environment on cardiovascular, respiratory, and neuro-cognitive health outcomes; environmental justice; and data visualization.

Topics studied have included:

  • Air pollution’s association with lung cancer, gestational diabetes, and heart attack
  • Air pollution exposure disparities across racial and socioeconomic groups
  • Increases in fine particulate matter air pollution during wildfires
  • The relationship between air pollution levels and COVID-19

Additionally, after nearly a decade of acquiring, curating, and linking public health, air pollution, and climate change exposure data, NSAPH established a one-of-a-kind data platform to enable multi-decade, nationwide studies of air pollution and health in the U.S. Research enabled by the platform has been explicitly cited as evidence supporting new policies to reduce air pollution exposure and improve health in the U.S.

Disparities Mapper

The NSAPH Disparities Mapper, an open-source web application, aims to draw attention to the socioeconomic disparities underlying air pollution exposure in a public-facing, accessible medium. Anyone can use the mapper to see air pollution levels and exposure disparities in their own community—bringing an element of personalization to air quality visualization and encouraging the public to advocate for more stringent, equitable air quality policies. The Disparities Mapper is only one example of the research that NSAPH does.

Research Motivation:

Socioeconomic status & pollution exposure

Existing research in biostatistics literature suggests that exposure to air pollution varies precipitously not only across the country, but also on the basis of certain racial/ethnic and income groups.

Project Objective:

Improving air quality

The goal of this web app is to highlight the aforementioned disparities in a public-facing and accessible medium. We hope this tool will bring an element of personalization to air quality visualization, informing policy outcomes in the process.

Technical Overview:

Linking together different data sources

Demographic data was sourced from the Decennial Census and combined with predictions of air pollution components generated by a research team at Harvard. The cumulative dataset spans across different levels of geographic granularity.