Impacts of Air Pollution on Life Expectancy across Multiple Generations: Race, Ethnicity, and Vulnerability Perspectives
Jason Su, Associate Researcher
Public Health
Closed. This professor is continuing with Spring 2024 apprentices on this project; no new apprentices needed for Fall 2024.
The goal of this study is to build upon previous work by examining statewide air pollution exposure and life expectancy disparities across generations and within communities.
The specific objectives of the research are as follows:
1. Conduct a systematic literature review, using peer-reviewed journal papers to identify effects of air pollution exposure on life expectancy with a focus on exposure to PM2.5.
2. Generate daily air pollution surfaces of PM2.5 at 100 m spatial resolution for the years 1989-2020 and assign one year of daily PM2.5 exposure to the residential addresses of all the Medi-Cal enrollees before date of death (i.e., rolling average) between 1990 and 2020.
3. Estimate total statewide reductions on life expectancy due to air pollution for each generation and statewide for each major race-ethnicity and vulnerability group and within families for both generations.
4. To analyze disparities at the CT level and aggregate the 100 m daily PM2.5 concentrations developed for 1989-2020 to generate CT mean annual PM2.5 concentrations.
Overall, this study will provide CARB with information on the impacts of PM2.5 exposure on life expectancy in the first generation and the second generation not only for California residents overall, but also for race-ethnicity and vulnerability subgroups. The subgroups with the greatest reductions in life expectancy due to increased PM2.5 exposure will be identified. This study will also identify at the CT level the communities that consistently experienced both the highest air pollution exposure and had the greatest life expectancy loss due to air pollution. Further, the study will provide research findings on changes in life expectancy from air pollution from the first generation to the second generation within families.
Role: The student will participate in scientific programming and health outcome analysis through R language, and draft papers for publication.
The student’s key learning outcomes will include increased proficiency in scientific computing with R, improved understanding of the impact of environmental factors on life expectancy and improved skills in drafting papers for scientific publication.
Qualifications: Required skills include strong writing skills, familiar with scientific computing in R and demonstrate an interest in studying the impacts of environment on health.
Hours: 9-11 hrs
Off-Campus Research Site: We would meet weekly for an hour over Zoom
Related website: https://publichealth.berkeley.edu/people/jason-su/
Related website: https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=64EdGIQAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate