Research Reports

This report describes a study by Dr. Patrick Ryan at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. He used the RIOPA data – which HEI has made available to all scientists on the Web to further explore relationships among the elemental composition of indoor, outdoor, and personal PM_2.5 samples collected at participant’s homes. His analyses included traditional and novel approaches to comparing the samples.

This report describes four studies conducted as a single phase (Phase 3B) of HEI's Advanced Collaborative Emissions Study (ACES) program, which was designed to evaluate the emissions and health changes resulting from substantially improved diesel engines required under the U.S. EPA 2007–2010 Heavy Duty Diesel Rule. These studies were conducted by Drs. Jacob D. McDonald of the Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Jeffrey C. Bemis of Litron Laboratories, Rochester, New York, Lance M. Hallberg of the University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas, and Daniel J. Conklin, University of Louisville, Kentucky.

This report describes a study to identify factors that influence exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and VOC mixtures. Dr. Stuart Batterman at the University of Michigan–Ann Arbor and colleagues used the extensive data that HEI posted on the Web from the Relationships of Indoor, Outdoor, and Personal Air (RIOPA) study (HEI Research Report 130 Parts I and II), and data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), to characterize exposure distributions for 15 VOCs, with an emphasis on high concentrations. Factors examined included geographic location, weather, characteristics of participants' homes, and specific activities, such as pumping gas.

This report describes a study that assessed levels of ultrafine particles and other pollutants around diesel engine school buses and identified factors contributing to those levels. Dr. Yifang Zhu at the University of California–Los Angeles, a recipient of HEI's Walter A. Rosenblith New Investigator Award, measured pollutant levels in and around school buses while driving, while idling, before and after retrofitting with a diesel particle filter and/or oxidation catalyst, and before and after installing an in-cabin filtration system.