Lisa Barcellos
University of California-Berkeley, CA·Public Health & Epidemiology
Wildfires in the western United States are becoming more intense and burning more land as the climate changes. Wildfire smoke has been linked to cancer, heart disease and breathing problems, but little is known about how smoke exposure leaves lasting marks on the body.
- Fields
Public Health & Epidemiology
Genetics
Earth & Environmental Science
- Topics
wildfire smoke
wildfires
air pollution
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Mar 2027
What they work on
- Develop comprehensive wildfire smoke exposure assignments for all members of a multi-ethnic cohort of about 5,000 East Bay adults sampled during the 2020–2021 wildfire seasons.
- Collect additional health outcome, lifestyle and environmental exposure data from all cohort members to expand this research resource for longitudinal study.
- Test whether wildfire smoke exposure is associated with genome-wide DNA methylation changes and older epigenetic age, a methylation-based estimate of biological age, in a pilot of 400 participants.
More about the research
One possible mark is DNA methylation: chemical tags on DNA that do not change the genetic sequence but can switch genes on or off. Methylation can also be used to estimate epigenetic age, a measure of biological rather than calendar age. This project asks whether breathing wildfire smoke changes DNA methylation and speeds up biological aging.
Why it matters
Wildfire smoke is a growing public health threat in the western United States. If smoke exposure leaves detectable DNA methylation changes, these could become biomarkers of exposure and health risk. Such biomarkers could help identify susceptible people and provide a rationale for strategies that reduce smoke-related harm to health.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Andres Cardenas
Stanford University, CA·Public Health & Epidemiology
Test whether a 12-month in-home HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filter intervention slows epigenetic and proteomic aging clocks in the nasal lining and blood of older former smokers with eosinophilic COPD, using samples from a randomized sham-controlled trial.
Brea Louise Perry
Indiana University, IN·Social Science
Test whether people's habitual patterns of contact with their personal networks ("social signatures") are associated with DNA methylation-based epigenetic age acceleration and polyepigenetic scores in about 2,600 P2P Health Interview Study participants.
Stephanie Tuminello
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NY·Public Health & Epidemiology
Test whether World Trade Center exposure accelerates biological aging in male responders, comparing blood DNA methylation clocks such as Horvath, GrimAge and DunedinPACE with unexposed men from the general population.
The school
University of California-Berkeley: 46 labs on PI Pages, $1.1B a year on research, 825 research doctorates a year.
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