Clean Air Science Corner

How Air Pollution Can Damage the Heart

2009-09-09T14:26:00.000-07:00

from Time Magazine

Sitting in traffic can certainly be infuriating enough to raise your blood pressure. But new research shows that traffic can raise your blood pressure and put your heart at risk in a more direct way — by exposing you to the pollution in exhaust fumes...

The new findings, published in the journal Hypertension, offers a potentially new understanding of how pollutants can affect the heart.

More at http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1921080,00.html

New federal study: traffic pollution kills people with respiratory problems

2009-05-01T11:24:00.000-07:00

There’s a new study in the current issue of Environmental Health Perspectives (published by a branch of the federal Department of Health and Human Services) which is perhaps worth a gander. See link below.

Basically, scientists found increased death among people with respiratory disease who were exposed to traffic-related nitrogen dioxide pollution in Toronto.

This is further evidence that current air quality standards for this pollutant need to be made tougher. The current standard was set in 1971 (!)

The US EPA reported last year that exposure to nitrogen dioxide – even at levels below current standards – increased the risk of hospital admissions.

The agency is under a court order to review the current national air standards for nitrogen dioxide and propose its results by June 26.

http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2009/11533/abstract.html

The Journal Nature: Time Running Out to Deal With Global Warming

2009-04-30T06:37:00.000-07:00

The world must burn less than one-quarter of its remaining fossil fuel reserves if it is to avoid dangerous climate change, according to new research.

Two studies published today in the journal Nature warn that the world must limit its total carbon dioxide emissions to about 1 trillion tons by 2050 to have the best chance at holding temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius.

That's the target identified by some scientists and many governments that believe warming beyond that point could greatly increase the chance of catastrophic -- and in some cases, irreversible -- changes in the world's climate.

The bottom line is simple, said Myles Allen of Oxford University, the lead author of one of the new studies. "Every ton [of carbon dioxide] you release now is a ton you won't be able to release in 50 years' time," he said. "The longer we postpone emissions reductions, the harder we make the task when the time comes around."

To stay under that 1 trillion ton limit, governments would have to sharply reduce their greenhouse gas emissions from current levels. Malte Meinshausen, lead author of one study, said the world's total CO2 emissions could reach 1 trillion tons in just 20 years.

If no climate policies are implemented (red), global warming will cross 2 degrees Celsius by the middle of the century. Strong action to mitigate emissions (blue) would limit the risk of exceeding 2 degrees to 25 percent. Graph courtesy of M. Meinshausen.

"We've already emitted a third of that in the past nine years, from 2000 to 2009," explained Meinshausen, a professor at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.

And Meinshausen's study suggests the true "carbon dioxide budget" could be even lower if the warming effects of other greenhouse gases, such as methane, are taken into account.

But even achieving the limit recommended by the new studies isn't a guarantee that the world will avoid serious climate change, experts said.

More at:

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7242/full/4581077a.html

A foetus suffers from a mother's bad air

2008-10-08T07:19:00.000-07:00

8th October 2008

Babies exposed to air pollution in the womb have to breathe faster to get more oxygen in their lungs, according to research confirmed that air pollution can damage a child's lungs before birth.

more at:

http://www.thewest.com.au/aapstory.aspx?StoryName=520582

Air pollution linked to blood clots

2008-05-13T13:44:00.000-07:00

Long-term exposure to a type of air pollution, the air-borne fine particles, appears to dramatically increase the risk of deep vein thrombosis, a condition that can lead to a life-threatening pulmonary embolism, according to a study in the May 12 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

More at http://foodconsumer.org/7777/8888/M_edicare_54/051309452008_Air_pollution_linked_to_blood_clots.shtml

Smog steals flower fragrance

2008-04-18T14:50:00.000-07:00

A very interesting study this week on how ozone, or smog, or harming the fragrance of flowers -- and inhibiting the ability of pollinating insects to follow the scent trail to their source.

More at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080410170413.htm

Outdoor smog hurts workers inside buildings

2008-01-29T04:54:00.000-08:00

Berkeley Lab Scientists Find Evidence of Link Between Outdoor Ozone and Building-Related Health Symptoms

BERKELEY, CA — A team of researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has found evidence that the prevalence of building-related symptoms (BRS) increases with increasing outdoor concentrations of the pollutant ozone. They have also discovered that the type of air filter that some buildings use in their ventilation systems may also play a role in the prevalence of BRS.

More at

http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/EETD-BRS.html

Kids and dirty air

2007-10-21T09:14:00.000-07:00

Researchers from UC Davis have found a closer link between bronchitis in infants and some gases and particles in air pollution, findings that bolster efforts in the Sacramento region to control emissions from vehicles and wood-burning stoves.

In one of the first studies to look at air pollution and infants, researchers said last week they found young lungs more vulnerable to little-studied components in air pollution called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs. Such contaminants get into the air from coal burning, vehicle exhaust, wood-burning stoves and tobacco smoke, and from grilling food.

"Our work suggests that regulators consider efforts to curb PAHs as well," lead researcher Irva Hertz-Picciotto said in a statement.

More from the Sacramento Bee at http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/445116.html

Global warming: it's not just the heat -- it's the humidity!

2007-10-10T14:38:00.001-07:00

By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

WASHINGTON - With global warming, the world isn‘t just getting hotter — it‘s getting stickier, due to humidity. And people are to blame, according to a study based on computer models published Thursday.

"This humidity change is an important contribution to heat stress in humans as a result of global warming," said Nathan Gillett of the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom, a co-author of the study.

Humidity increased over most of the globe, including the eastern United States, said study co-author Katharine Willett, a climate researcher at Yale University. However, a few regions, including the U.S. West, South Africa and parts of Australia were drier.

To show that this is man-made, Gillett ran computer models to simulate past climate conditions and studied what would happen to humidity if there were no man-made greenhouse gases. It didn‘t match reality.

Gillett‘s study followed another last month that used the same technique to show that moisture above the world‘s oceans increased and that it bore the "fingerprint" of being caused by man-made global warming.

"This story does now fit together; there are now no loose ends," said Ben Santer, a scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Lab and author of the September study on moisture above the oceans. "The message is pretty compelling that natural causes alone just can‘t cut it."

It will only feel worse in the future, Gillett said.

Diesel pollution linked to heart disease

2007-07-26T10:13:00.000-07:00

from today's Los Angeles Times:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-heart26jul26,1,5279648.story?coll=la-headlines-california&ctrack=2&cset=true

Pollution-cholesterol link to heart disease seen The combination activates genes that can cause clogged arteries, UCLA researchers say.

By Marla Cone, Times Staff Writer
July 26, 2007

Strengthening the link between air pollution and cardiovascular disease, new research suggests that people with high cholesterol are especially vulnerable to heart disease when they are exposed to diesel exhaust and other ultra-fine particles that are common pollutants in urban air.
Microscopic particles in diesel exhaust combine with cholesterol to activate genes that trigger hardening of the arteries, according to a study by UCLA scientists to be published today.

The full study is at
http://genomebiology.com/2007/8/7/R149

Smog worse for women than men?

2007-06-28T05:58:00.000-07:00

Study: Ozone affects females more than men

HERSHEY, Pa., June 27 (UPI) -- A Penn State University College of Medicine study suggests air pollution has a more significant effect on the immune systems of females than of males.
Researchers studied mice exposed to ozone and then infected with pneumonia. Significantly more females than males died from the infection.

"If we could extrapolate what we found to the human population, it would mean women with lung infections may be at higher risk for negative outcomes if they are exposed to high amounts of air pollution, and in particular, ozone," said Professor Joanna Floros.

In the study, mice were exposed for three hours either to filtered air or to air with high levels of ozone. They then were infected with a pneumonia bacteria and monitored for two weeks.
The findings, among other things, showed mice exposed to ozone before infection died more often than did mice that had breathed only filtered air. And ozone exposure significantly decreased the likelihood of surviving pneumonia exposure for the female mice compared with males.

more at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070627-14250700-bc-us-ozone.xml

Large Antarctic Area Has Melted

2007-05-16T04:14:00.000-07:00

from the New York Times:

While much of the world has warmed in a pattern that scientists have linked with near certainty to human activities, the frigid interior of Antarctica has resisted the trend.

NASA’s QuikScat satellite detected extensive areas of snowmelt, shown in yellow and red, in west Antarctica in January 2005.

Now, a new satellite analysis shows that at least once in the last several years, masses of unusually warm air pushed to within 310 miles of the South Pole and remained long enough to melt surface snow across a California-size expanse.

The warm spell, which occurred over one week in 2005, was detected by scientists from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA and the University of Colorado, Boulder...

It is too soon to know whether the warm spell was a fluke or a portent.

More bad climate news: artic ice retreating more rapidly

2007-04-30T14:32:00.000-07:00

Arctic Ice Retreating More Quickly Than Computer Models Project

April 30, 2007
BOULDER
Arctic sea ice is melting at a significantly faster rate than projected by even the most advanced computer models, a new study concludes. The research, by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and the University of Colorado's National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), shows that the Arctic's ice cover is retreating more rapidly than estimated by any of the 18 computer models used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in preparing its 2007 assessments.http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2007/seaice.shtml

New report: global warming is here -- and it's big trouble

2007-04-06T06:44:00.000-07:00

More at http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/06/science/earth/06cnd-climate.html?hp

and www.ipcc.ch

Medical experts urge tougher smog standards

2007-04-05T08:43:00.000-07:00

April 4, 2007

The Honorable Stephen L. Johnson
Administrator
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
1200 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20460

Re: Broad Scientific Consensus to Lower Ozone Air Quality Standard and Close the Rounding Loophole

Dear Administrator Johnson:

We, the undersigned scientists, doctors, and public health professionals, are writing to express strong support for a revised primary eight-hour ozone ambient air quality standard at a level that reduces the health burden experienced by the nation's population as the result of exposure to ozone air pollution. The National Ambient Air Quality Standards must accurately reflect the state of the science and fulfill the Clean Air Act's mandate of protecting the public health, including those most vulnerable to the effects of air pollution, with an adequate margin of safety.

We note that the EPA's panel of expert science advisors, the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC), has reviewed the scientific evidence in the EPA Criteria Document and Staff Paper and has unanimously recommended that "the primary 8-hr NAAQS needs to be substantially reduced to protect human health, particularly in sensitive subpopulations" (CASAC letter to Administrator Johnson, dated October 24, 2006). We also agree with their unanimous conclusion that “there is no scientific justification for retaining the current primary 8-hour NAAQS.” Expert opinion, including recommendations by EPA staff scientists in the final Staff Paper, holds that retaining the current standard would put large numbers of people at risk for respiratory effects, asthma exacerbations, emergency room visits, hospital admissions, and mortality.

The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee has further recommended that EPA close the “rounding loophole” which allows areas with concentrations up to 0.085 ppm to escape regulation under the current standard of 0.08 ppm, a position that we fully endorse.

The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee has further unanimously recommended an eight-hour primary ozone standard in the range of 0.060 ppm to 0.070 ppm. The Committee specifically expressed its recommendation to the third decimal place to avoid the rounding loophole. This recommendation was unanimously reconfirmed in a March 5, 2007 meeting of the Committee.

Such strongly worded consensus statements are unusual for this panel of scientists, which is deliberately selected to represent a variety of viewpoints. These unambiguous, unanimous recommendations to your office reflect the strong body of scientific literature indicating significant harm to adults and children from exposures to ozone at and below the current standard of 0.08 ppm (effectively 0.085 due to rounding).

Controlled human exposure studies of healthy adults have repeatedly demonstrated reduced lung function, increased respiratory symptoms, changes in airway responsiveness, and increased airway inflammation following 6.6 hour exposures to 0.08 ppm ozone. Recent studies demonstrate that some of the people tested experience these adverse effects at concentrations of 0.06 ppm and below. Multiple field studies have shown adverse health effects of ozone exposures below 0.08 ppm on children, especially worsening of respiratory status in asthmatics. In addition, a series of recently published meta-analyses and primary national-scale epidemiological studies have documented consistent associations between premature mortality and ozone exposures below the current eight hour standard of 0.08 ppm.

In conclusion, we strongly and solemnly request that you follow the recommendations of the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee and reduce the eight-hour primary ozone standard to a range between 0.060 and 0.070 ppm.
Thank you for considering our views.
Sincerely,

Jonathan I. Levy, Sc.D.
Associate Professor of Environmental Health and Risk Assessment
Harvard School of Public Health

Kent Pinkerton, Ph.D.
Director of the Center for Health and the Environment
University of California at Davis

William Rom, M.D., M.P.H.
Sol and Judith Bergstein Professor of Medicine and Environmental Medicine
Director of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

Additional signatories

Jerrold L. Abraham, M.D.
Professor of Pathology
Director of Environmental and Occupational Pathology
SUNY Upstate Medical University

Joseph Adams, M.D., F.A.C.P.
Greater Baltimore Medical Center
Towson, Maryland

Robert Aris, M.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine
Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Ed Avol, M.S.Department of Preventive MedicineUniversity of Southern California

John M. Balbus, M.D., M.P.H.
Health Program Director
Environmental Defense
Adjunct Associate Professor
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Rebecca Bascom, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of Medicine
Penn State University, College of Medicine

William S. Beckett, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of Environmental Medicine and Medicine
University of Rochester School of Medicine

Kenneth A. Berkowitz, M.D., F.C.C.P.
Associate Professor of Medicine
New York University Medical Center

Jonathan A. Bernstein, M.D., F.A.A.A.A.I.
Professor of Clinical Medicine
Division of Immunology/Allergy
University of Cincinnati

Kent J. Bransford, M.D.
Monterey Bay Oncology
Monterey, California

Katherine L. Bright, M.D.
Associate Professor of Pediatrics
University of Kentucky

Arezoo Campbell, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences
Western University of Health Sciences

Lung Chi Chen, M.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Environmental Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

David Chong, M.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

David C Christiani, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of Medicine
Harvard Medical School
Professor of Occupational Medicine and Epidemiology
Harvard School of Public Health

Devra Davis, Ph.D., M.P.H.
Professor of EpidemiologyDirector of the Center for Environmental Oncology
University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute

Dorr G. Dearborn, Ph.D., M.D.
Professor of Pediatrics
Chairman of the Department of Environmental Health Sciences
Case Western Reserve University

George L. Delclos, M.D., M.P.H.
Director of the Division of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences
University of Texas

Ralph J. Delfino, M.D., Ph.D.
Epidemiology Division
University of California at Irvine

Anthony J. DeLucia, Ph.D.
Professor of Surgery
Adjunct Professor of Environmental Health
East Tennessee State University

Richard D. Dey, Ph.D.
Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy
Director of the Center for Respiratory Biology and Lung Disease
West Virginia University

Jefferson H. Dickey, M.D.
Bodkhe Dickey Health Associates
Franklin Medical Center
Greenfield, Massachusetts

Douglas W. Dockery, Sc.D.
Professor of Environmental Epidemiology
Chair of the Department of Environmental Health
Harvard School of Public Health

Lisa Doggett, M.D., M.P.H.
Austin, Texas

Martin Donohoe, M.D., F.A.C.P.
Lecturer in the Department of Community Health
Portland State University

Harold J. Farber, M.D.
Specialist of Pediatric Pulmonology and Medical Director of the Pediatric Asthma Care Management Program at Kaiser Permanente
Vallejo, California

Karl Fields, M.D.
Professor of Family Medicine
University of North Carolina

Jonathan M. Fine, M.D.
Research Associate Professor
New York University School of Medicine

Henry Jay Forman, Ph.D.
Professor and Founding FacultySchool of Natural Sciences
University of California, Merced

Mark W. Frampton, M.D.
Professor of Medicine and Environmental Medicine
University of Rochester Medical Center

Erica Frank, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of the Department of Health Care and Epidemiology
University of British Columbia

Michael Friedman, M.D.
Chennai, India

George Friedman-Jiménez, M.D.
Director, Bellevue/NYU Occupational and Environmental Medicine Clinic
New York University School of Medicine

John R. Froines, Ph.D.
Professor of Occupational and Environmental Health
University of California at Los Angeles

Frank Gilliland, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine
Keck School of Medicine
University of Southern California

Lynn Goldman, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of Environmental Health Sciences
Johns Hopkins University

Bob Gould, M.D.
Associate Pathologist at Kaiser Hospital
San Jose, California

Roni Grad, M.D.
Associate Professor of Pediatrics
University of Alabama at Birmingham

Tee L. Guidotti, M.D., M.P.H.
Chair of the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health
Director of the Division of Occupational Medicine and Toxicology (Dept. of Medicine)
The George Washington University Medical Center

David C. Hall, M.D.
Specialist in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Seattle, Washington

Winifred J. Hamilton, Ph.D., S.M.
Assistant Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Neurosurgery
Baylor College of Medicine

S. Katharine Hammond, Ph.D., C.I.H.
Professor and Chair of Environmental Health Sciences
University of California at Berkeley

Michael R. Harbut, M.D., M.P.H., F.C.C.P.
Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine
Wayne State University School of Medicine

Ira Helfand, M.D.
Specialist in Emergency Care
Leeds, Massachusetts

Howard Hu, M.D., M.P.H., Sc.D.
Chair and Professor of Environmental Health Sciences
University of Michigan

Kazuhiko Ito, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Environmental Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

Dan Jaffe, Ph.D.
Professor of Environmental Science
University of Washington-Bothell

Sarah Jordan, M.D., M.S.P.H.
Specialist in Family Care Medicine at the Siler City Community Health Center
Piedmont Health Services, Inc.
Siler City, North Carolina

Patrick L. Kinney, Sc.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Environmental Health Sciences
Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University

Howard M. Kipen, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor of Environmental and Occupational Medicine
Chief of the Clinical Research and Occupational Medicine Division
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey

Jane Q. Koenig, Ph.D.
Professor of Environmental Health
University of Washington

Dana L. Kornfeld, M.D.
Clinical Associate Professor of Pediatrics
George Washington University Medical Center

Ana Krieger, M.D., F.C.C.P.
Assistant Professor
New York University School of Medicine

Nino Kuenzli, M.D., Ph.D.Associate Professor
Department of Preventative Medicine
University of Southern California Center for Research in Environmental Epidemiology
Barcelona, Spain

Francine Laden, Sc.D.
Assistant Professor of Environmental Epidemiology
Harvard University

William Lambert, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine
Oregon Health and Science University

Joyce C. Lashof, M.D.
Professor Emerita of Public Health
University of California at Berkeley

Robert S. Lawrence, M.D.
Professor of Environmental Health Sciences and Health Policy
Director of the Center for a Livable Future
Johns Hopkins University

Eric Leibert, M.D.Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine New York University School of Medicine

George Leikauf, Ph. D.
Professor of Environmental Health and Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
University of Cincinnati

Deborah Leiner, M.D., F.A.A.P.
Clinical Associate Professor of Pediatrics
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Chair of the North Carolina Pediatric Society Environmental Health Group
Greensboro, North Carolina

Louis S. Libby, M.D.
Specialist in Pulmonology and Chief Medical Officer at the Oregon Clinic
Portland, Oregon

Michael Lipsett, M.D., J.D.
Associate Clinical Professor
Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics
University of California, San Francisco

Alan H. Lockwood, M.D.
Professor of Neurology and Nuclear Medicine
Adjunct Professor of Communicative Disorders and Sciences
State University of New York at Buffalo

Frank Martiniuk, PhD
Research Associate Professor
New York University School of Medicine

Rob S. McConnell, M.D.
Professor of Preventive Medicine
Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California

Siobhan McNally, M.D., F.A.A.P.
Specialist in Pediatrics
Pittsfield, Massachusetts
Co-chair of the Massachusetts Section of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Environmental Health

Peter H. Michelson, M.D.
Department of Pediatrics
Division of Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine
Duke University

Jana Milford, Ph.D., J.D.
Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
University of Colorado at Boulder

Albert Miller, M.D.
Professor of Medicine
New York Medical College
Director of Pulmonary Medicine
Caritas Health Care
Jamaica, NY

Shelly L. Miller, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Environmental Engineering Program in the Department of Mechanical Engineering
University of Colorado at Boulder

John S. Munger, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Medicine and Cell Biology
New York University School of Medicine

Bonnie A. New, M.D., M.P.H.
Beacon Medical Management for Industry
Coordinator of Health Professionals for Clean Air
Houston, Texas

Anna Nolan, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care
New York University School of Medicine

George T. O’Connor, M.D., M.S.
Professor of Medicine
Boston University School of Medicine

Marie S. O’Neill, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and Environmental Health
University of Michigan

Peter Orris, M.D., M.P.H.
Professor and Director, Occupational Health Services Institute
University of Illinois School of Public Health

Cindy L. Parker, M.D., M.P.H.
Instructor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences
Johns Hopkins University

Jerome A. Paulson, M.D., F.A.A.P.
Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Public Health
Co-Director of the Mid-Atlantic Center for Children's Health and the Environment
George Washington University

Jennifer L. Peel, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology
Department of Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences
Colorado State University

Arnold C.G. Platzker, M.D.
Professor of Pediatrics
Division of Pediatric Pulmonology
University of Southern California

Jenny E. Pompilio, M.D.
Practitioner of Internal Medicine
Hillsboro, Oregon

Joan Reibman, M.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine and Environmental Medicine
New York University

Don Richardson, M.D.
Brevard, North Carolina

Beate Ritz, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Epidemiology, Environmental Health Sciences, and Neurology
Vice Chair of the Department of Epidemiology
University of California at Los Angeles

Jonathan Samet, M.D., M.S.
Professor and Chair of Epidemiology
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Brian S. Schwartz, M.D., M.S.
Professor of Environmental Health Sciences, Epidemiology, and Medicine
Johns Hopkins University

Joel Schwartz, Ph.D.
Professor of Environmental Epidemiology
Harvard University

Katherine M. Shea, M.D., M.P.H.
Adjunct Professor of Maternal and Child Health
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Dean Sheppard, M.D.
Professor of Medicine
Director of the Lung Biology Center
University of California at San Francisco

Carl M. Shy, M.D.
Professor Emeritus of Epidemiology
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Constantinos Sioutas, Sc.D.
Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Co-director of the Southern California Particle Center
University of Southern California

John D. Spengler, Ph.D.
Akira Yamaguchi Professor of Environmental Health and Human Habitation
Harvard University

Helen Suh, S.B., M.S., Sc.D.
Associate Professor of Environmental Chemistry and Exposure Assessment
Harvard University

Tim K. Takaro, M.D., M.P.H., M.S.
Associate Professor
Faculty of Health Sciences
Simon Fraser University

Duncan C. Thomas, Ph.D.
Director of the Biostatistics Division
Department of Preventive Medicine
University of Southern California

Catherine Thomasson, M.D.
Practitioner of Internal Medicine
Center for Student Health and Counseling
Portland State University

George D. Thurston, Sc.D.
Associate Professor of Environmental Medicine
New York University

Doris Tse, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

Arthur Upton, Ph.D.
Professor of Environmental and Community Medicine
Rutgers University

Judith A. Voynow, M.D.
Associate Professor of Pediatrics
Division of Pediatric Pulmonary Medicine
Duke University

Bailus Walker Jr., Ph.D, M.P.H.
Professor of Environmental and Occupational Medicine and Toxicology
Howard University

Virginia M. Weaver, M.D., M.P.H.
Associate Professor
Division of Occupational and Environmental Health
Johns Hopkins University

Ronald H. White, M.S.T.
Associate Scientist
Department of Epidemiology
Deputy Director of the Risk Sciences and Public Policy Institute
Johns Hopkins University

Michelle Wilhelm, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor In Residence
Department of Epidemiology
University of California at Los Angeles

Peter Wilk, M.D.
Specialist in Psychiatry
Sebago, Maine

Antonella Zanobetti, Ph.D.
Research Scientist
Department of Environmental Health
Harvard University

Junfeng (Jim) Zhang, Ph.D.
Professor and Acting Chairman
Department of Environmental and Occupational Health
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey

New study: particle soot boosts heart disease in women

2007-01-31T12:53:00.000-08:00

From the University of Washington:

Women living in areas with higher levels of air pollution have a greater risk of developing cardiovascular disease and subsequently dying from cardiovascular causes, according to a University of Washington study appearing in the Feb. 1 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine. The study is one of the largest of its kind, involving more than 65,000 Women's Health Initiative Observational Study participants, age 50 to 79, living in 36 cities across the United States.

UW researchers studied women who did not initially have cardiovascular disease, following them for up to nine years to see who went on to have a heart attack, stroke, or coronary bypass surgery, or died from cardiovascular causes. They linked this health information with the average outdoor air pollution levels near each woman's home, and found that higher pollution levels posed a significant hazard – much higher than previously thought – for development of cardiovascular disease.

The researchers studied levels of fine particulate matter, which are tiny airborne particles of soot or dust, and can come from a variety of sources, like vehicle exhaust, coal-fired power plants, industrial sources, and wood-burning fireplaces. These particles are less than 2.5 microns in diameter -- about 30 to 40 of them would equal the diameter of a human hair. Particulate matter levels are monitored and regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). They're typically invisible to the human eye once they're in the atmosphere, though they may be visible in dense clouds as they come out of a tailpipe, smokestack or chimney, and are responsible for urban haze.

"These soot particles, which are typically created by fossil-fuel combustion in vehicles and power plants, can contain a complex mix of chemicals," explained Dr. Joel Kaufman, professor of environmental & occupational health sciences, epidemiology, and medicine at the UW, and leader of the study. "The tiny particles – and the pollutant gases that travel along with them – cause harmful effects once they are breathed in."

Fine particulate matter is measured in micrograms (or millionths of a gram) per cubic meter; cities in the study had average levels of fine particulate matter ranging from about 4 to nearly 20 micrograms per cubic meter. The researchers found that each 10-unit increase in fine particulate matter level was linked to a 76 percent increase in the risk of death from cardiovascular disease, after taking into account known risk factors such as blood pressure, cholesterol, and smoking. Higher long-term average levels of fine particulate matter also led to a higher overall risk of cardiovascular disease events, including stroke and heart attack.

They also found that local differences in particulate matter levels within a city, as well as exposure differences between cities, translate to a higher or lower risk of cardiovascular disease and related death.

"Our findings show that both what city a woman lived in, and where she lived in that city, affected her exposure level and her disease risk," said Kristin Miller, first author of the study and a doctoral student in epidemiology at the UW.

Previous studies have found apparent links between airborne particulate matter and cardiovascular disease, but this study was the first to look specifically at new cases of cardiovascular disease in previously healthy subjects and local air pollution levels within metropolitan areas. Researchers used data from the multi-site Women's Health Initiative Observational Study, which is funded by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and coordinated through a center based at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle. The EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences provided funding for the study of the effects of air pollution.
Scientists don't understand exactly how fine particulate matter may be leading to cardiovascular disease, but some believe that the soot particles are accelerating atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries, which is the major precursor of heart disease.

"This could be a cellular and biochemical process that starts in the lung and then proceeds from there into the cardiovascular system," Kaufman explained. "Or it could be that these very small particles actually enter the blood stream through vessels in the lung, and then begin affecting blood vessels throughout the body."

Kaufman is leading a major new EPA-funded study to uncover these mechanisms – an air-pollution study based on the NIH's Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis, or MESA. The MESA Air Pollution Study tackles two key areas for understanding this problem, Kaufman said: investigating the mechanisms through which particulate matter leads to cardiovascular disease, and identifying the sources of pollution that cause the problem. "Preventing these effects requires reducing the pollution at the source," Kaufman said.

The implications of this connection could be very significant.

"More than one out of three deaths in the United States are due to cardiovascular disease – it's the leading cause of death," Miller said. "If the annual average concentration of fine particulate air pollution can be reduced, it would potentially translate on a national scale to the prevention or delay of thousands and thousands of heart attacks, strokes, and bypass surgeries, not to mention fewer early deaths."

An editorial from researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health and Brigham and Women's Hospital will accompany the study in the Feb. 1 issue of the journal. In that editorial, the authors suggest public health interventions to address this problem, as well as a tightening of the EPA standards regulating fine particulate matter pollution.

In addition to Kaufman and Miller, the study included researchers from the UW School of Medicine and the School of Public Health and Community Medicine, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and Harborview Medical Center, all in Seattle.

NOTE: To determine the average annual concentration of fine particulate matter for a particular city or county, visit the EPA's Air Trends Web site and look for "PM 2.5 Wtd AM" in the tables provided. The most recent data available from the EPA is from 2005. http://www.epa.gov/airtrends/factbook.html

Glaciers melting at unprecedented speed

2007-01-29T14:18:00.000-08:00

Published: January 29 2007

Mountain glaciers around the world are melting at an unprecedented rate, according to new scientific data that will reinforce pressure on governments to take stronger action on global warming.

The World Glacier Monitoring Service in Zurich, Switzerland, said preliminary estimates for 2005 based on monitoring of 30 “reference” glaciers showed an average loss of 0.6 metres in ice thickness.

The 2005 figures match the average annual loss rate since 2000, which is one-and-a-half times the average annual ice loss in the 1990s and three times the loss rate of the 1980s, the WGMS said.

Experts fear upcoming global warming report may understate problem

2007-01-29T11:54:00.000-08:00

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Later this week in Paris, climate scientists will issue a dire forecast for the planet that warns of slowly rising sea levels and higher temperatures.
But that may be the sugarcoated version.

Early and changeable drafts of their upcoming authoritative report on climate change foresee smaller sea level rises than were projected in 2001 in the last report. Many top U.S. scientists reject these rosier numbers.

Those calculations don't include the recent, and dramatic, melt-off of big ice sheets in two crucial locations:

They "don't take into account the gorillas -- Greenland and Antarctica," said Ohio State University earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. "I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century."

Michael MacCracken, who until 2001 coordinated the official U.S. government reviews of the international climate report on global warming, has fired off a letter of protest over the omission.
The melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are a fairly recent development that has taken scientists by surprise. They don't know how to predict its effects in their computer models. But many fear it will mean the world's coastlines are swamped much earlier than most predict.

Others believe the ice melt is temporary and won't play such a dramatic role.

That debate may be the central one as scientists and bureaucrats from around the world gather in Paris to finish the first of four major global warming reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel was created by the United Nations in 1988.

After four days of secret word-by-word editing, the final report will be issued Friday.

The early versions of the report predict that by 2100 the sea level will rise anywhere between 5 and 23 inches. That's far lower than the 20 to 55 inches forecast by 2100 in a study published in the peer-review journal Science this month. Other climate experts, including NASA's James Hansen, predict sea level rise that can be measured by feet more than inches.

The report is also expected to include some kind of proviso that says things could be much worse if ice sheets continue to melt.

The prediction being considered this week by the IPCC is "obviously not the full story because ice sheet decay is something we cannot model right now, but we know it's happening," said Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate panel lead author from Germany who made the larger prediction of up to 55 inches of sea level rise. "A document like that tends to underestimate the risk," he said.
"This will dominate their discussion because there's so much contentiousness about it," said Bob Corell, chairman of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, a multinational research effort. "If the IPCC comes out with significantly less than one meter (about 39 inches of sea level rise), there will be people in the science community saying we don't think that's a fair reflection of what we know."

In the past, the climate change panel didn't figure there would be large melt of ice in west Antarctica and Greenland this century and didn't factor it into the predictions. Those forecasts were based only on the sea level rise from melting glaciers (which are different from ice sheets) and the physical expansion of water as it warms.

But in 2002, Antarctica's 1,255-square-mile Larsen B ice shelf broke off and disappeared in just 35 days. And recent NASA data shows that Greenland is losing 53 cubic miles of ice each year -- twice the rate it was losing in 1996.

Even so, there are questions about how permanent the melting in Greenland and especially Antarctica are, said panel lead author Kevin Trenberth, chief of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.

While he said the melting ice sheets "raise a warning flag," Trenberth said he wonders if "some of this might just be temporary."

University of Alabama at Huntsville professor John Christy said Greenland didn't melt much within the past thousand years when it was warmer than now. Christy, a reviewer of the panel work, is a prominent so-called skeptic. He acknowledges that global warming is real and man-made, but he believes it is not as worrisome as advertised.

Those scientists who say sea level will rise even more are battling a consensus-building structure that routinely issues scientifically cautious global warming reports, scientists say.
The IPCC reports have to be unanimous, approved by 154 governments -- including the United States and oil-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia -- and already published peer-reviewed research done before mid-2006.

Rahmstorf, a physics and oceanography professor at Potsdam University in Germany, says, "In a way, it is one of the strengths of the IPCC to be very conservative and cautious and not overstate any climate change risk."

Federal government: 2006 hottest year on record

2007-01-10T04:11:00.000-08:00

We've been feeling the heat, and now the federal government confirms it:
2006 was the hottest year on record:

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2007/s2772.htm

Air pollution increases risk of heart attack

2006-12-05T07:03:00.000-08:00

Study: Air Pollution Increases Risk of Heart Attack

December 4th, 2006 @ 6:01pmEd Yeates Reporting (KSL TV, Utah)

The American Heart Association's respected publication "Circulation" shows people with clogged arteries have an increased risk of heart attack after short term exposure to air pollution.

We are in the beginning stage of our own seasonal air inversion. Bad air, like we see here every year, was the basis for this Utah collaborative study. Brigham Young University and LDS Hospital teamed up on this latest research.

And it was extensive. It shows that very short term exposure to air pollution increases the risk of heart attack in those who have coronary artery blockage.

Jeffrey Anderson, M.D., LDS Hospital Cardiologist: "What was sobering about this study is even one or two or three days of exposure can bring on a heart attack."

Dr Jeffrey Anderson, along with a team of LDS Hospital cardiologists and colleagues, joined epidemiological researcher Dr. Arden Pope at BYU to collect this latest data. It shows a four percent increased risk of a heart attack for every ten milligrams of air containing fine pieces of particulate or soot (less than one hundredths the width of a human hair).

Anderson: "That's small particulate. Now that sounds like a fairly small increase, but we, on a bad day, might have an increase of a hundred, so ten times that." These little fine pieces, suspended in heavier concentrations during inversions, pretty much all come from vehicles and industry. Dr. Arden Pope, BYU Epidemiological Research: "They're not generated by wind blown dust or anything like that. They're almost entirely from burning things or high temperature industrial processes."

Circulation is publishing the Utah study because the evidence is backed with big numbers. Dr. Benjamin Horne, LDS Hospital Public Health Research: "typical studies have hundreds. This one had thousands. We had about five to six-thousand individuals who were having unstable chest pain or heart attacks." Along with the five to six thousand LDS Hospital was specifically following, an additional eight thousand people came into the hospital electively on those bad air days. HORNE: "THIS IS A BIG PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE" More studies are yet to come. Researchers want to find out what the pollution-triggered inflammation mechanism really is that causes the problem. They also want to find ways to protect these people during inversions.

Groups sue Bush administration for suppressing global warming science

2006-11-14T09:34:00.000-08:00

CLIMATE: Lawsuit accuses Bush admin of suppressing global warming assessment

Advocacy groups filed a lawsuit today aimed at forcing the Bush administration to produce an assessment of the effects of global warming and the state of climate science...

The administration's decision to follow its 2000 national assessment of climate science and consequences with a series of 21 staggered, narrowly defined reports violates the Global Change Research Act of 1990, the three groups said in their complaint.

The Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

The groups are asking the court to force the government -- through its Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) and the Office of Science and Technology Policy -- to produce a second national climate assessment.

Report for Tony Blair predicts big trouble on global warming

2006-10-30T06:25:00.000-08:00

Address climate change or risk global depression: economist

Failure to tackle the problem of climate change could trigger a worldwide economic slowdown along the same level as the Great Depression, warns a new report from a British economist.
Written by former World Bank economist Sir Nicholas Stern at the request of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the 700-page report was released on Monday.

"Our actions over the coming decades could create risks of major disruption to economic and social activity, later in this century and in the next, on a scale similar to those associated with the great wars and the economic depression of the first half of the 20th century," says the report.

Failure to immediately tackle climate change could see global economic growth shrink by 20 per cent and cost the world economy close to $7 trillion US, warns Stern.

The report suggests other effects could include:
200 million new refugees as people are displaced by severe flooding or droughts.
Water shortages for one in six people.
A spike in world temperatures of up to 5 C.
Melting glaciers that could lead to water shortages.
20 to 40 per cent of wildlife species to become extinct.

More at http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2006/10/30/climate-cost.html

New study links traffic pollution to heart attacks

2006-10-12T05:21:00.000-07:00

Pollution from automobile traffic is linked with a significantly increased risk of heart attacks, according to a study published Oct. 11

An increase in traffic near the home was associated with a 4 percent increase in the risk of having a heart attack, and living near a major road was associated with a 5 percent increase, according to the study by six Massachusetts researchers.

The study was published online in Environmental Health Perspectives, a journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. The six researchers were from the Harvard School of Public Health, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and University of Massachusetts Medical School.

"We observed a significant association between exposure to traffic near the place of residence and the occurrence of acute myocardial infarction," the study said.

The research team analyzed the pollution levels near homes of 5,049 people in Worcester, Mass., who had heart attacks between 1995 and 2003 and compared that information to pollution of 10,277 people who did not have a heart attack.

http://www.ehponline.org/members/2006/9587/9587.pdf

NASA rings new global warming alarm bell; US has warmest summer since the Dust Bowl era

2006-09-14T16:09:00.000-07:00

Two new NASA studies are raising alarm bells about global warming.

Scientists with the space agency have found that there is a decline in the amount of arctic sea ice in the winter. Their findings also show the decline is occurring at a faster rate.

Meanwhile, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said 2006 was the warmest summer in the U.S. since the Dust Bowl in the 1930s -- and the second warmest since the record keeping began in 1895.

Scientists say global warming causing more violent hurricanes

2006-09-12T11:15:00.001-07:00

A new study reports stronger links between human-caused global warming and rising ocean temperatures -- a key factor in the development and growth of hurricanes.

The new study was done by researchers at Lawrence Livermore lab in California.

''We've now learned that the human-induced buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere appears to be the primary driver of increasing hurricane activity,'' Robert Corell, an oceanographer and a researcher for the American Meteorological Society, said during a press conference to promote the study.

The findings were published Monday in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.