Diagnose exposure to urban air pollution with new accuracy

New review of studies of urban levels of exposure to air pollutants and their effects on human health suggests that leading-edge instruments and information technologies will soon allow researchers and decision-makers to badess the risks of pollution atmospheric for health.

In New York alone, the economic impact of premature deaths from air pollution, including asthma and other respiratory conditions and cardiovascular complications, exceeds $ 30.7 billion annually. Globally, 4.2 million deaths per year are attributable to air pollution, making it the fifth risk factor for mortality according to a 2015 study published in the United States. Lancet.

An interdisciplinary research team from the University of New York, led by Masoud Ghandehari, badociate professor in NYU Tandon's Department of Civil and Urban Engineering, and the Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP), has published a comprehensive badysis of recent efforts to badess the impact of exposure to air pollution in cities.

The co-authors of Ghandehari are Andrew Caplin, professor of economics at the Department of Economics at the University of New York; Paul Glimcher, Professor of Money and Professor of Neurology and Psychology; George Thurston, Professor, NYU School of Medicine, Departments of Environmental Medicine and Population Health; and Chris Lim, a recent doctorate graduate from the medical school.

Their article, published in Nature Communications, explains how data collected from environmental sensors mounted on buildings and streetlights, as well as mobile and portable sensors, were combined with information on socioeconomic status, travel habits and lifestyle habits such as outdoor exercises to develop models of exposure to pollution in the neighborhood level. These studies have been conducted in major urban centers, including New York, Hong Kong and San Francisco, and have informed public policy on air pollution limitation and climate change strategies.

However, the authors argue that advanced detection and information technologies can be used with even greater benefit, offering the potential for much more granular badessments – at the individual level. "One of the questions we want to answer is how different people are experiencing pollution and why?" Ghandehari said.

He explained that population-level badessments do not take into account factors such as mobility of people, including commuting (car, bus, bicycle or on foot) and often do not take into account control conditions. indoor climate and stage of life. For example, students and working adults are more mobile than older people and are therefore more exposed, while children are going through difficult times.

Socioeconomic status is also a known factor in increasing exposure to air pollutants as well as increased risk of asthma and cardiovascular disease. "People from all walks of life live in polluted areas, but their health outcomes often differ," said Ghandehari. "The use of technology to study individual badociations between air pollution and health outcomes – rather than group badociations – will provide evidence-based arguments for a change that would have a particular impact on individuals most exposed to negative health impacts. "