Mitigation of health effects of exposure to traffic-related air pollutants during travel.

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Summary: This PhD project will develop new methods to assess and mitigate the health effects of exposure to traffic-related air pollutants during travel within NHS patient transport vehicles. The project will use miniature air pollution monitors and geographical information science to interpret associations between exposure and changes in blood pressure, heart rate variability, and respiratory function. The project involves collaboration with RTI International [1], Transport Scotland, and medical colleagues in the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital University in Glasgow. The letters of support for this application illustrate how strategic development of collaborative research at the interface between environmental engineering and public health will be of direct benefit to NHS patients and professional drivers travelling to and from the largest hospital in the UK.Background: The health effects of air pollution are subject to intense scientific scrutiny, with exposure consistently associated with illness & shortening of life expectancy [2]. Exposures to road traffic-related pollutants are particularly important and have formed the basis of air pollution regulation in Europe. However the evidence base remains limited by deficiencies in methods used to estimate pollution exposures. Until now a key limitation has been a lack of portable pollution monitoring instruments suitable for quantification of frequently substantial exposures while people travel within urban areas. Through extant NERC and Innovate UK research, and strategic research infrastructure funding, the studentship will benefit from availability of state of the art, portable air quality monitoring equipment. The project will build on existing practical experience in field evaluation of sensors [3,4] to use novel monitoring systems recently developed by RTI International to examine the effect of air pollution exposure on potentially highly exposed professional drivers and potentially susceptible individuals attending NHS Blood Pressure and Sleep & Respiratory clinics. The exposure of professional drivers for Transport Scotland's Trunk Road Incident Support Service to traffic-related air pollution will also be assessed as context to the main study of exposure within NHS vehicles.Objectives: * To develop novel use of miniature, unobtrusive monitoring systems to assess health effects of exposure to air pollution during travel (including development and application of the host research consortium's on-going field evaluations of state of the art miniature airborne particle [mass, number, black carbon] and gas [nitrogen dioxide, ozone] sensor systems [3,4]).* To design simple intervention studies to determine the health benefits of reducing pollution exposure during travel (including strategic operation of cabin-ventilation/filtration systems in response to external traffic conditions; and investigation of the benefits of innovative high-efficiency cabin-filtration [5]).References:[1] http://www.rti.org/[2] http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1104509[3] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2015.04.059 [4] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2014.11.002[5] http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es404952q