Emerging environmental hazards and health

In the UK alone over 350,000 chemicals enter the environment each year and we still know very little about the impacts of most chemical pollutants on complex natural ecosystems and on human health.

With the Emerging Environmental Hazards and Health theme, we are advancing new ways of identifying, monitoring, modelling and mitigating pollution across air, soil and water and taking a systems perspective of how these threats interact and the link with human health. The focus will be on cross-cutting challenges presented to the environment and health by emerging hazards such as microplastics, pesticides, household chemicals and combustion-related chemicals

Theme Champions

This theme is led by Professor Frank Kelly (School of Public Health) and Professor Guy Woodward (Department of Life Sciences).

Highlights

Man applying tick and flea prevention treatment and medicine to his dog or pet

Are urban areas hotspots for pollution from pet parasiticides?

Read the Grantham Institute's briefing paper considering the environmental impact of the pet parasiticides commonly used to kill parasites such as fleas and ticks

Breathe London logo

Breathe London

Imperial's Environmental Research Group (ERG) has partnered with media and infrastructure company Clear Channel to pilot a new initiative integrating Breathe London air quality sensors into digital advertising displays in the borough of Barking and Dagenham. Breathe London is a network developed by the ERG, funded by the Mayor of London and Bloomberg Philanthropies, to provide real-time, hyperlocal air quality data to Londoners, via the Breathe London website.

Georgina Mace Centre for the Living Planet

The Georgina Mace Centre for the Living Planet is one of Imperial’s Centres of Excellence, bringing together a multidisciplinary group of researchers to tackle some of the greatest environmental challenges. Many challenges facing human society depend on the interaction between ecological systems, the environment and human wellbeing. Yet our current understanding of these complex systems is mostly insufficient for science-based intervention.

WellHome project

Children growing up in the UK today represent an 'indoor child generation', with most of their activities taking place in enclosed spaces such as homes and schools. These locations often have complex air quality environments. Despite its importance in human exposure terms, links between indoor air quality and public health is a relatively under-researched area. Co-designed with the local community in White City, West London, the WellHome study focuses on the air quality inside and outside of over 100 homes with asthmatic children. The project is coordinated by the College’s Environmental Research Group, led by Professor Frank Kelly