Research
With support from the NIH, the Center for Environment, Exposure and Health (CEEH) and others, National Jewish Health is searching for greater understanding of the environmental, equity and exposure-related determinants of health and disease.
Our research program is designed to:
- Enhance health and well-being
- Prevent and mitigate or treat the impact of environmentally and exposure-induced diseases
- Educate patients, communities and the next generation of researchers and practitioners
- Translate findings to public health and policy
Examples of current research programs and grants follow.
- The Center of Environment, Exposure and Health is currently partnered with the Healthy Homes Denver study, which is spearheaded by Energy Outreach Colorado Project. The goal of our Center: testing the impact of the healthy home program on respiratory and cardiovascular health and the overall quality of life in children and their families. The Healthy Home Program was started by the City and County of Denver Office of Climate Action, Sustainability and Resiliency.
- We also evaluate the impact of air pollution on lung diseases. As an example, Dr. James L. Crooks and Dr. Lisa A. Maier work with Dr. Mark Mallozzi on a project to evaluate the impact of air pollution on sarcoidosis, a disease that impacts the lungs and other organs in the body including the cardiovascular and neurologic systems. As a disease that affects Black individuals more than White individuals and those of lower income and who are under resourced, National Jewish Health is trying to understand how air pollution may be impacting disease manifestations and severity. This work has been funded by two foundations, the American Thoracic Society and Foundation for Sarcoidosis Research.
We also collaborate with other investigators across the metro Denver and Front Range area in this research.
Our scientific research is funded by many sources, including federal grants, foundations, National Jewish Health and private donations.
Kauvar Symposium on the Impact of Climate on Respiratory Health and Immunity
The CEEH hosted the Kauvar Symposium on October 27, 2023, which brought together investigators and colleagues from across Colorado to discuss research focused on environmental health to promote conversations, collaboration and research in this area.
Published Research
| Publication | Journal / Date | Summary |
|---|---|---|
| Occupational exposure to ambient air pollution: At-risk worker groups, regulatory and research needs. An official American Thoracic Society Workshop Report. | Annals of the American Thoracic Society. 2025 Nov;22(11):1619-1632. | Reviews evidence on occupational ambient air pollution exposure and worker health, identifies high-risk worker groups, and provides research and policy recommendations. |
| Associations of fire smoke and other pollutants with incident rheumatoid arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis-associated interstitial lung disease. | Arthritis & Rheumatology. 2025 Jul;77(7):808-816. | Patient-control study using VA data evaluating associations between multiple air pollutants (including fire smoke PM2.5) and incident RA and RA-ILD. |
| Dust storms and cardiorespiratory emergency department visits in three Southwestern United States: application of a monitoring-based exposure metric. | Environmental Research: Health. 2024 Sep 1;2(3):031003. | Uses a validated approach to identify dust storm days and estimates associations with cardiorespiratory ED visits; findings suggest dust storms pose a respiratory health risk. |
| Investigating the relationship between extreme weather and cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis in Colorado: A multi-decade study using distributed-lag nonlinear models. | International Journal of Hygiene and Environmental Health. 2024 Jul;260:114403. | Examines temperature and precipitation extremes and reported infections across Colorado counties using distributed-lag nonlinear models over lags up to 12 months. |
| Hawaiian volcanic ash, an airborne fomite for nontuberculous mycobacteria. | Geohealth. 2023 Dec 30;8(1):e2023GH000889. | Evaluates whether volcanism contributes to NTM growth and dispersal; recovers disease-associated NTM from local environments and volcanic ash. |
| Evaluating data product exposure metrics for use in epidemiologic studies of dust storms. | Geohealth. 2023 Aug 26;7(8):e2023GH000824. | Compares dust storm metrics from multiple public data products to a monitor-based dataset and evaluates agreement to support epidemiologic research. |
| The association of residential distance from highly trafficked roads with atopic dermatitis risk. | Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In Practice. 2023 May;11(5):1554-1555. | Reports an association between closer residential proximity to highly trafficked roads and increased atopic dermatitis diagnosis in children. |
| Exposures to low-levels of fine particulate matter are associated with acute changes in heart rate variability, cardiac repolarization, and circulating blood lipids in coronary artery disease patients. | Environmental Research. 2022 Nov;214(Pt 1):113768. | Repeated-measures panel study assessing short-term cardiovascular responses to PM2.5 and ozone among men with stable coronary artery disease. |
| The unintended benefits of the conservation reserve program for air quality. | Geohealth. 2022 Oct 11;6(10):e2022GH000648. | Models relationships between CRP and PM2.5 concentrations and estimates avoided mortality under counterfactual scenarios. |
| The ozone climate penalty, NAAQS attainment, and health equity along the Colorado Front Range. | Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology. 2022 Jul;32(4):545-553. | Examines ozone climate penalty patterns and associations with community-level demographic and health equity indicators along Colorado’s Front Range. |
| Realistic biomarkers from plasma extracellular vesicles for detection of beryllium exposure. | International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health. 2022 Oct;95(8):1785-1796. | Explores EV-based blood biomarkers as potential non-invasive indicators of beryllium exposure and related risk assessment. |
| Occupational and environmental exposures in the Genomic Research in Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency and Sarcoidosis (GRADS) study. | Respiratory Medicine. 2022 Aug-Sep;200:106923. | Analyzes demographic, occupational and environmental exposure data and evaluates associations with sarcoidosis phenotypes in GRADS. |
| Associations between wildfire-related PM2.5 and intensive care unit admissions in the United States, 2006-2015. | Geohealth. 2021 May 1;5(5):e2021GH000385. | Links wildfire smoke exposure to ICU admissions and estimates ICU bed needs under a simulated severe smoke event. |
| Associations between dust storms and intensive care unit admissions in the United States, 2000-2015. | Geohealth. 2020 Aug 1;4(8):e2020GH000260. | Investigates associations between dust storms and ICU admissions to better understand critical care demand impacts. |
| The impact of weather and climate on pollen concentrations in Denver, Colorado, 2010-2018. | Annals of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology. 2019 Nov;123(5):494-502.e4. | Assesses interactions between pollens and meteorology and evaluates how weather and climate relate to pollen concentrations and season timing in Denver. |
| Impact of wildfire smoke on adverse pregnancy outcomes in Colorado, 2007-2015. | International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2019 Oct 2;16(19):3720. | Estimates associations between wildfire smoke PM2.5 exposure during pregnancy and outcomes including preterm birth and birth weight. |
| Heatwaves and diabetes in Brisbane, Australia: A population-based retrospective cohort study. | International Journal of Epidemiology. 2019 Aug 1;48(4):1091-1100. | Evaluates heatwave impacts on hospitalizations and post-discharge deaths for diabetes and explores modifiers at individual and community levels. |
| The associations between clinical respiratory outcomes and ambient wildfire smoke exposure among pediatric asthma patients at National Jewish Health, 2012-2015. | Geohealth. 2019 Jun 3;3(6):146-159. | Retrospective analysis of wildfire smoke exposure and lung function and asthma control measures during nonurgent clinic visits. |
| Putting on partisan glasses: Political identity, quality of life, and oil and gas production in Colorado. | Energy Policy. 2019 Jun;129:738-748. | Examines how political identity relates to perceptions of local oil and gas development impacts and self-reported quality of life. |
| Cardiopulmonary effects of fine particulate matter exposure among older adults, during wildfire and non-wildfire periods, in the United States 2008-2010. | Environmental Health Perspectives. 2019 Mar;127(3):37006. | Evaluates cardiopulmonary hospitalizations among older adults and compares associations during smoke and non-smoke days across exposure metrics. |
| Introduction to the 60th Annual Thomas L. Petty Aspen Lung Conference. Environment and Global Lung Health: Exposure, Susceptibility, and Intervention. | Annals of the American Thoracic Society. 2018 Apr;15(Suppl 2):S61-S63. | Introduces the conference theme and framing around environment and global lung health, with emphasis on exposure, susceptibility and intervention. |