Using epigenetic science to improve environmental health literacy

利用表观遗传学提高环境健康素养

• 批准号: 10524680
• 负责人: Michael Rountree
• 金额: $ 64.97万
• 依托单位: NZUMBE EPIGENETICS
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-01-01 至 2024-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10524680
• 关键词: Active Learning; Affect; Air; American; Architecture; Award; Basic Science; Behavior; Biological Models; Biology; Brain; Breathing; Businesses; Chemicals; Collaborations; Communities; Computer software; Consumption; Custom; Decision Making; Development; Disease; Disease susceptibility; Eating; Education; Educational process of instructing; Endowment; Environment; Environmental Exposure; Environmental Health; Epigenetic Process; Equipment; Financial Support; Folic Acid; Gene Expression Regulation; Genes; Goals; Grant; Growth; Habits; Health; Health Professional; Home; Human; Human Development; Institution; Knowledge; Laboratories; Language; Learning; Learning Module; Life Style; Link; Marketing; Measures; National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences; Neurospora; Neurospora crassa; Oregon; Organism; Outcome; Persons; Phase; Phenotype; Play; Policy Maker; Pollution; Population; Pregnancy; Process; Public Health; Reporting; Risk; Role; Safety; Schools; Science; Scientist; Shapes; Small Business Innovation Research Grant; Social Interaction; Statutes and Laws; Stress; Structure; Students; Testing; Time; Translations; Universities; Vertebral column; Visual; Visualization; Work; college; cost; education cost; epigenetic regulation; epigenome; experience; experimental study; falls; fetal; fictional works; fungus; genetic makeup; grasp; hands-on learning; health disparity; health literacy; high school; human disease; improved; in silico; innovation; junior high school; learning outcome; man; member; model organism; novel; offspring; online delivery; response; risk mitigation; success; tool; undergraduate student; web based software

Project Summary NIEHS defines environmental health as “the field of science that studies how the environment influences human health and disease”. The environment in this definition includes the natural environment, man-made chemicals and structures that often pollute the natural environment, and our social interactions and lifestyle choices. Because toxic environments are linked directly to human health and disease, a critical need exists to educate the American population on this relationship to allow us to make informed choices about the amount of risk we are willing to take. Stated differently, to improve public health we need to improve environmental health literacy (EHL), the goal of RFA-ES-21-008 (Innovative Approaches for Improving Environmental Health Literacy). The RFA requests collaborations between small businesses and environmental scientists “to develop novel tools, activities, or materials to build EHL”. In response, Nzumbe Inc. has partnered with media experts (SquishyMedia) environmental and education scientists at Oregon Health & Science University, Oregon State University and local undergraduate institutions to submit this proposal. Our strategy is to use epigenetic science as an education bridge to improve EHL because the basics of this science are relatively easy to understand and the epigenome responds to environmental exposures in ways that can improve or worsen health. To accomplish this goal, our SBIR Phase I and now our Phase II application focuses on developing two “experiential” educational tools. The first tool, delivers interactive learning modules in an online software application that utilizes “gamification” principles to teach users how the environment impacts our epigenome and health as a consequence. Gamification offers a variety of benefits associated with learning outcomes, including enhancing user-engagement, learning, and knowledge retention. Our software application will include the “EpiMon” app, a stylized interactive game that will utilize the epigenetic principles that the student has learned and apply them to fictional creatures (EpiMon) in a fictional world. The second tool, is an educational laboratory kit that will emphasize and tie in principles taught with the software product. The lab kit utilizes a simple and safe model organism, Neurospora crassa, to demonstrate basic epigenetic principles and how environmental exposures can influence the epigenetic regulation of gene expression. While the kit will contain control experiments to demonstrate these principles, it will also offer the students the ability to experiment with growth conditions to determine their impact on epigenetic gene regulation. Unlike most laboratory kits in the marketplace where the experimental outcome is pre-determined, the experiential approach of our kit puts the keys in the hands of the student. Results will be reported to an accompanying software application module where students can compare their results with classmates and other schools to identify exposures with epigenetic activity. Successful completion of the proposed work will enable us to extend these tools to public school students and the interactive software to the lay public and public health professionals at little to no cost.

项目摘要 NIEHS将环境健康定义为“研究环境如何影响的科学领域” 人类健康和疾病“。这一定义中的环境包括自然环境、人为环境 经常污染自然环境以及我们的社会互动和生活方式的化学品和结构 选择。由于有毒环境与人类健康和疾病直接相关，因此迫切需要 对美国民众进行关于这种关系的教育，使我们能够在知情的情况下选择 我们愿意承担的风险。换句话说，为了改善公众健康，我们需要改善环境健康 扫盲(EHL)，RFA-ES-21-008(改善环境健康的创新方法)的目标 识字)。RFA要求小企业和环境科学家之间的合作，以“开发 建造弹流回路的新工具、新活动或新材料“。作为回应，Nzumbe Inc.与媒体专家合作 (SquishyMedia)俄勒冈州立健康与科学大学的环境和教育科学家 大学和地方本科院校提交这份建议书。我们的策略是利用表观遗传学 科学作为改善EHL的教育桥梁，因为这门科学的基础知识相对容易 理解和表观基因组以可以改善或恶化的方式对环境暴露做出反应 健康。为了实现这一目标，我们的SBIR第一阶段和现在的第二阶段应用程序专注于开发两个 “体验式”教育工具。第一个工具，提供在线软件中的互动学习模块 利用“游戏化”原理告诉用户环境如何影响我们的表观基因组的应用程序 以及由此带来的健康。游戏化提供了与学习结果相关的各种好处， 包括增强用户参与度、学习和知识保留。我们的软件应用程序将包括 EpiMon应用程序，一款风格化的互动游戏，将利用学生拥有的表观遗传学原理 学习并将它们应用于虚构世界中的虚构生物(EpiMon)。第二个工具，是一个教育工具 实验室工具包，强调并与软件产品教授的原则相结合。该实验室试剂盒利用了 简单而安全的模式生物，粗糙脉孢菌，以演示基本的表观遗传原理和如何 环境暴露会影响基因表达的表观遗传调控。而试剂盒将包含 对照实验演示这些原理，它还将为学生提供实验的能力 生长条件以确定它们对表观遗传基因调控的影响。与大多数实验室试剂盒不同的是 实验结果预先确定的市场，我们试剂盒的体验式方法将 钥匙在学生手中。结果将报告给附带的软件应用程序模块 在那里，学生可以将他们的结果与同学和其他学校进行比较，以确定接触情况 表观遗传活动。拟议工作的成功完成将使我们能够将这些工具扩展到公众 学校的学生和互动软件以很少的费用甚至免费的方式向公共和公共卫生专业人员提供。