Representatives from the 26 NIEHS-funded Environmental Health Science (EHS) Core Centers recently gathered in Baltimore to discuss the evolving concept of the community exposome. The exposome is the sum of all the environmental exposures a person experiences throughout their lifetime and the body’s response. Exposome research is known as exposomics.

“The highly integrated meeting emphasized the important role of community engagement in exposomics,” said Claudia Thompson, Ph.D., program director of the EHS Core Center Program. “Many communities have recognized the need for understanding the totality of exposures over their lifetimes and its potential health consequences.”

The meeting organizers brought together community-engaged researchers, plus community members and scientists, to share their diverse viewpoints on implementing exposomics, particularly as it relates to environmental justice and environmental health disparities. Speakers emphasized the importance of involving communities in environmental health research and the need for better ways to measure and mitigate the cumulative impacts of environmental stressors on the health of disadvantaged communities.

“Applying the framework of the exposome at the community level provides the opportunity to accurately measure cumulative environmental exposures and connect them to health status to develop targeted public health prevention and intervention strategies and policies,” said Marsha Wills-Karp, Ph.D., who leads the EHS Core Center at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

Gathering data

Underpinning this important work is the accurate measurement of exposures and the management of different types of data.

One session explored the integration of genomics, proteomics, metabolomics, and other ‘omics technologies to advance understanding of the human exposome. Another session explored integrating health, social, and psychological data with ‘omics data to reveal effects of community-level environmental exposures.

At a community level, participants recognized the need for, and value of, community-collected data. For example, the increased availability of high-quality affordable air pollution sensors in the past decade has changed the landscape for conducting community-based air pollution studies. Communities now have an unprecedented ability to collect and own their data and contribute to exposomics studies.

Integrating expertise

Sessions were explicitly designed to integrate the perspectives of community partners and research scientists.

Community partners shared the impact of flooding in Philadelphia, the East Palestine, Ohio train derailment, and exposures to coal dust in South Baltimore (see sidebar). Scientists presented research on exposure to microplastics and exposures to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. They also described federal resources available to aid research.

A session spotlighting new investigators featured presentations across an array of exposures of concern. Scientists shared mapping of asthma exacerbations linked to certain urban housing and arsenic exposure among some private rural well users. Others shared research examining the role of the gut in regulating exposure to toxins and efforts to build a model to study the impact of exposures on the development of Parkinson’s Disease.

Seeking environmental justice

Attendees also heard success stories and learned best practices from community-engaged researchers focused on achieving environmental health equity and environmental justice. Researchers presented efforts to reduce asthma symptoms in youth, and monitoring of environmental contaminant exposures by members of vulnerable communities.

In looking to the future, the EHS Core Center at Johns Hopkins plans to convene colleagues from centers in states with legislation addressing the negative effects of cumulative exposure, according to Chris Heaney, Ph.D., director of community engagement at the center.