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Welcome to the home page of the HEAT (Health Effects of Air Toxics) research team! 

I am an Assistant Professor at Baylor College of Medicine. My research interests center around developing air pollution modelling for exposure assessment and analyzing biomarkers of diseases associated with air pollution exposures and child health. 

Many people ask me the meaning of the team logo. The top part of the logo is composed of bars that can be interpreted in multiple ways: as a city skyline, a statistical bar chart, a dispersion gradient, or pollutant meters—bringing together elements to our work. The left side of this section is inspired by the view of the Texas Medical Center, where we are based. The star above represents our location in the "Lone Star State."

In the middle of the logo, you’ll find "HEAT," the acronym for our team’s name. The font, "Ultra," was chosen as it is widely associated with Texas.

Below the acronym, the flowing symbol is adapted from an "air flow" design in Adobe Express. The black dot and leaf elements symbolize key components of our research: air pollution and pollen. To highlight the diversity of pollutants we study—air toxics, hazardous air pollutants (HAPs), and traffic-related air pollution—I added a white dot to it. 

We occasionally have paid and unpaid volunteering positions in our group. If you are interested in joining the team, please send your CV to me (xueying.zhang@bcm.edu).