Embedded Files
2025
2025
The group had a fantastic showing at the ISEE conference, along with other Michigan affiliates. Team-members (and former team members) Nia, Meredith, Boya, and Sara all had oral talks and Tingfan, Ekta, and Meredith all shared their work with poster presentations. A fantastic time was had by all!
Dr. Meredith Pedde was granted a new award to study the indoor air pollution concentrations and noise levels on electric school buses. We had a great team effort to collect data in a Michigan and a North Carolina school district and now she's onto more testing in Oregon. Congratulations Meredith!
Our first year doctoral student, Nia Clements, has passed her competency exam with flying colors and advances to candidacy. She has also been awarded a 2-year fellowship in aging by the NIH-funded T32 center. Congratulations Nia!
Congratulations to Dr. Jiaqi Gao who will be starting a new post-doc at the University of Minnesota. It's been a delight to have Jiaqi in our group during her masters and PhD degrees so she'll be missed!
Sara Adar discusses the work of the Gateway Exposome Coordinating Center at the Exposome Moonshot Forum in Washington D.C. She encourages the audience to keep their eyes on the northern star, which is to provide high-quality, evidence-based research to improve health and to promote the next generation of scientists in the field.
The Gateway Exposome Coordinating Center hosted a successful expert workshop in Los Angeles to discuss methodological gaps, challenges, and opportunities related to how the climate, physical environment, social environment, policy environment, community services, and life experiences can promote healthy or accelerated aging.
2024
2024
Katherine Francois and Sara Adar led a series of six town halls for the Gateway Exposome Coordinating Center where approximately 300 unique participants from 130 organizations across 21 countries shared their feedback about priority topics and data needs to understand the impact of the exposome on healthy aging.
Dr. Jiaqi Gao's first dissertation paper is published in Lancet Healthy Longevity! In this work, Jiaqi and the rest of the EPOCH study team documented that higher exposures to air pollution over the lifetime were associated with a greater likelihood of physical function disability in late life. Congratulations Jiaqi and team!
We are delighted to welcome Nia Clements to our group as a new doctoral student.
We celebrated the launch of the new Gateway Exposome Coordinating Center project, co-lead by Drs. Adar, Jinkook Lee, and David Knapp, with a meeting in Washington D.C. of engaged stakeholders from the NIA, NIEHS, EPA, HHS, AAPR, and academia. The GECC is a federally funded initiative seeking to make and share high-quality data about how people's experiences and environments (i.e., the “exposome”) contribute to dementia.
Parks provide space to relax and recharge but are often not designed with seniors in mind. A new paper by Dr. Alan Fossa as part of his dissertation research looks at how different kinds of vegetation in parks near home relate to depression in older adults. Read more here.
Sara Adar talks about why it is beneficial to replace old school buses with cleaner buses with SciLine by the AAAS. You can listen here.
New research from our EPOCH study in JAMA Network Open documents higher risks of lost independence in late life with greater exposure to particulate air pollution. Congratulations to Dr. Boya Zhang, the first author of the paper, and the full team! The story has been picked up by news outlets including the Guardian and WEMU radio.
There's a new doctor in the house! Dr. Jiaqi Gao did a fantastic job defending her dissertation on air pollution as a risk factor for physical function limitations and disability using data from the Health and Retirement Study. Congratulations Dr. Gao!
Many celebrations are in order for our group this summer. Our data manager, Adam, had a beautiful new baby, Tingfan passed his competency exam with flying colors, Meredith Pedde was awarded an MLEEaDs Center Scientist Grant, Ekta Chaudhary completed her PhD and was awarded a Global Health Postdoctoral Fellowship, and Sara Adar was promoted full professor . Congratulations team!
We're delighted to welcome Katherine Francois to the team as our new project coordinator. Welcome Katherine!
So proud of Stephanie Grady who successfully defended her impressive dissertation on community, traffic, and aircraft noise and health. Congratulations Dr. Grady!
Congratulations to Meredith Pedde for her Best Paper in Child Health Policy Award of 2024 from the UM Child Health Evaluation and Research Center! It was wonderful to see her honored for her work on the attendance benefits of EPA's Clean School Bus Rebate program.
We are delighted to welcome Ekta Chaudhary to our group as a post-doctoral fellow. Ekta comes to us from the Centre for Atmospheric Sciences at IIT-Delhi.
Congratulations to Meredith Pedde who had two papers published within one month! Her last dissertation paper in EHP looks at how coarse particulate matter is related (or not) to inflammation and coagulation using the MESA cohort.
Dr. Alan Fossa published a great paper on how nature impacts our mental health and how the impacts of "green" can change depending on your climate region. Congratulations Alan!
How representative are the EPA monitors at capturing the full US population experience? Find out more here in Meredith Pedde's new paper, out in February.
2023
2023
Dr. Adar is featured in the University of Michigan School of Public Health Population Healthy podcast in the episode "The Invisible Impacts of Air Pollution." Listen here.
Dr. Adar visits the University of Toronto to give a keynote lecture on the benefits of replacing diesel school buses on children's attendance and educational performance. While there she visits the fantastic Jeff Brook and the Canadian air pollution concentrator and exposure chamber.
Dr. Meredith Pedde receives a promotion to Assistant Research Scientist in the Department of Epidemiology. We're so excited to welcome you to the faculty Meredith and delighted to continue to collaborate with you!
Our EPOCH paper on fine particulate matter from different emission sources and dementia that was led by Dr. Boya Zhang is listed in the top 5 trending medical papers in September 2023. Congratulations team!
Ph.D. student and mentee, T.C. Cho, wins the 2023 Poster Award at the Gerontological Society of America conference for her interesting work on wealth shocks and cognition in older adults. Congratulations TC!
Dr. Adar gives a talk on household air pollution and health in low- and middle-income countries at the National Academy of Sciences.
We are delighted to welcome Tingfan Jin as a new PhD student in our group! Read more about Tingfan here.
New research from our EPOCH study in JAMA Internal Medicine documents higher risks of dementia with greater exposure to particulate air pollution, especially when from agricultural and wildfire sources. Congratulations to Boya Zhang, the first author of the paper, and the full team! The story has been picked up by news outlets including CNN, the Washington Post, CBS, and even live ABC TV news in Australia.
Dr. Alan Fossa defends his PhD dissertation studying the affects of residential and recreational greenspace on mental health in older adults. He did such a fantastic job and we're so proud of him!
Dr. Meredith Pedde's dissertation work is published at Nature Sustainability demonstrating that EPA's funding for clean school buses resulted in approximately 350,o00 days of attendance in children per year. We further estimated that replacing the oldest buses in the whole country would result in 1.3M kids in school each year. Read more about her impressive work here.
Dr. Boya Zhang defends her PhD dissertation on air pollution as a risk factor for dementia and lost independence in late life. We're so proud of her and all that she's accomplished!
2022
2022
Dr. Meredith Pedde demonstrates that EPA funding for clean school buses over a 6 year period resulted in more 350,o00 days of attendance using RCT methods from a natural experiment of policy intervention and shares her findings at the ISEE 2022 meeting. She also shares findings about the effectiveness of EPA monitors to represent populations in exposure models.
Alan Fossa, PhD candidate, shares his findings that greenspace reduces depression in older adults in a nationally representative cohort to a packed audience at ISEE2022.
Dr. Jen D'Souza presents her exciting research at ISEE 2022 showing that light at night and traffic noise are associated with greater depression in older adults in a nationally representative cohort.
PhD candidate Boya Zhang shares her findings of particulate matter exposures from different sources as a risk factor for dementia and lost independance at older ages at ISEE 2022.
2nd year PhD candidate Jiaqi Gao presents her work at ISEE 2022 showing that particulate matter from traffic and agriculture along with other sources are associated with increased risk of disability in a nationally representative cohort.
Several members of the Adar group travel to Athens to share our research with our colleagues at the ISEE 2022 meeting. Science and fun was shared by all.
The environmental team on the Gateway to Global Aging project, led by Dr. Adar, enjoyed a fun and productive week in the Grand Tetons kicking off their project on the environment and dementia in 8 countries from North and South America, Europe, and Asia.
Dr. Adar along with her collaborators, Drs. Jinkook Lee (USC), Alden Gross (Johns Hopkins), and David Knapp (USC), were awarded a $19.3M grant from the NIA to continue building a resource for aging research around the globe. Sara will be leading the research team that focuses on the role of the environment on cognitive decline and dementia across 8 countries.
Dr. Filigrana demonstrates in her new paper from her dissertation research that switching from motorized commuting to active transport like biking and walking would improve air pollution concentrations and save lives.
Dr. Pedde publishes her dissertation research on predicting coarse particles with satellite measurements in 6 US cities.
Dr. Filigrana publishes her dissertation research on near-road exposures to traffic-generated pollution and mortality in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
2021
2021
Congratulations to our doctoral student, Alan, and his wife, Chrissy, on their new baby!
Drs. D'Souza, Adar, and colleagues publish new findings that suggest that the noise levels in your neighborhood can influence your blood pressure and ability to keep your hypertension in check.
Dr. Adar and colleagues at the School of Public Health receive a new $13M award from the NIH to begin a prospective cohort study called MI-CARES of environmental risk factors for cancer in Michigan.
Dr. Adar and colleagues at the School of Public Health and Michigan Medicine receive a new award from the CDC on the impacts of air pollution on ALS.
New research of Drs. Pedde, Adar, and colleagues is published in EHP that summarizes what is known about the relationships between air pollution and dementia.
Dr. Adar is appointed Associate Chair of the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Michigan School of Public Health as the head of the PhD program.
PhD student, Meredith Pedde, successfully defended her dissertation regarding epidemiology to support environmental regulations. Congratulations Dr. Pedde!
Drs. Adar, Jennifer Weuve, and colleagues are awarded two new large grants from the National Institutes of Aging to study the impacts of air pollution and noise on cognitive aging and neuropathology.
New research of doctoral student Rachel Shaffer, Dr. Adar, and colleagues is published in EHP that links low levels of PM air pollution with the development of dementia in older adults in the Seattle area.
New research by Dr. Adar and collaborators demonstrates that the use of highly polluting biomass fuel for cooking and heating is associated with worse cognition in older adults in India, Mexico, and China even after adjustment for education and socioeconomic position.
We are delighted to welcome Jiaqi Gao as a new PhD student in our group starting this fall!
2020
2020
Research from Dr. Paola Filigrana's dissertation project is published demonstrating the usefulness of local traffic data in understanding air pollution levels in near road communities.
New research of Drs. Adar, Jennifer Weuve, and colleagues links community noise exposure with prevalent dementia and mild cognitive impairment in older adults from Chicago. This research was covered by media outlets including the New York Times and was published in Alzheimer's and Dementia.
Drs. Adar, Jennifer Weuve, and colleagues are awarded two new large grants from the National Institutes of Aging to study the impacts of air pollution and noise on cognitive aging and neuropathology.
2019
2019
We celebrate Dr. Paola Filigrana's return to Colombia to work at the Ministry of Health at ISEE in Utrecht.
The Adar group welcomes two new doctoral students, Alan Fossa and Boya Zhang, to the team. We're so glad that you're here!
Dr. Adar uses her research on school buses to advise Senator Kamala Harris's office (D-California) on a new bill to replace older, higher polluting school buses with electric buses. For more background on the bill, click here. For the full bill text, click here.
PhD student, Paola Filigrana, defended her dissertation regarding the impacts of traffic-related emissions in near road communities. Congratulations Dr. Paola!
2018
2018
Dr. Adar and colleagues' new paper highlights methodological concerns of confounding by both time and age in longitudinal studies. This work was cited as the most read paper at Environmental Health Perspectives of the week.
Dr. Adar and colleagues at the Institute for Social Research, Boston University, and the University of Washington receive funding from the NIEHS and NIA to research the impacts of long-term exposures to air pollution on health and health care costs in an aging US population.
Dr. John Erb-Downward presents our provocative findings entitled "Sequencing Vapor - Differentiating Something from Nothing when Sequencing Ultra-Low Biomass Samples" at the American Thoracic Society Conference. This work is part of our project investigating the microbiome as a potential mediator or modifier of associations between air pollution and health. See more in our review paper here.
Congratulations to our doctoral student, Meredith Pedde, and her husband, Gabe Ehrlich, on their new baby girl!
We successfully launched our pilot data collection in New Dehli and Chennai as part of our work on air pollution and cognition in the Longitudinal Aging Study of India.
Dr. Adar heads to Amherst, MA to collect measurements inside of electric and diesel school buses.
2017
2017
MESA Air's research on long-term exposures to air pollution and the progression of atherosclerosis wins the Best Environmental Epidemiology Paper of 2016 from the International Society of Environmental Epidemiology. Read the paper in the Lancet here.
Doctoral student, Meredith Pedde, wins a prestigious fellowship from the American Heart Association to support her work on the cardiovascular health effects of coarse particulate matter in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis using spatiotemporal models derived from satellite data. Congratulations Meredith!!
Former doctoral student, Paul Christine, wins an Excellence in Public Health Award from the U.S. Public Health Service Physician Professional Advisory Committee. Congratulations Paul!
Dr. Adar is promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. She will spend next year in Seattle with her family for sabbatical.
2016
2016
Dr. Adar is elected Secretary/Treasurer of the International Society of Environmental Epidemiology.
Dean Martin Philbert, Dr. Adar, and other faculty from the University of Michigan School of Public Health visit the West China Hospital and School of Medicine at Sichaun University to form new collaborations.
Road trip! Our research group heads to Chicago to collect noise measurements in the MESA and CHAP communities. In the meantime, we enjoyed each other's company, saw the city, and enjoyed some good food.
Dr. Adar participates in the review of the Draft Integrated Science Assessment for the EPA’s National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Particulate Matter
2015
2015
Congratulations to MD-PhD student, Paul Christine, on defending his dissertation regarding the impacts of the neighborhood environment on health. Now its off to finish medical school.
Our paper shows that the national switch to cleaner diesel likely reduced absenteeism by as much as 14 million days per year among American school bus riders.
Dr. Adar goes to the EPA to participate in a workshop on policy-relevant science to inform the EPA’s review of the primary and secondary National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Particulate Matter
2014
2014
Dr. Adar is awarded the University of Michigan School of Public Health Excellence in Teaching Award.
Dr. Adar goes to Lansing to speak at the Michigan State Senators and House of Representatives luncheon about the health effects of air pollution from coal combustion.
Congratulations to Jeff Wing who earned his PhD studying racial and ethnic disparities in the health consequences of exposures to air pollution on stroke in the BASIC study.
Congratulations to Jana Hirsh who did an amazing job of defending her dissertation on neighborhood environment and physical activity. Enjoy one of her interesting videos on her research.
Dr. Adar participates in the review of the Draft Integrated Science Assessment for the EPA’s National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Sulfur Oxides.
2013
2013
Dr. Adar's paper on air pollution and atherosclerosis is covered by Oprah Magazine, the New York Times, and National Public Radio among others.
Dr. Adar is featured on the Korean Broadcasting System's Mysteries of the Human Body (3 million viewership).
Doctoral student, Yeh-Hsin Chen, defends his dissertation entitled "Analysis of air pollution, hypertension, and neighborhood walkability". Congratulations Yeh-Hsin!
Former post-doc, Kai Zhang, starts a new Assistant Professor job at the University of Texas School of Public Health. Congratulations Kai!
Report abuse