Author: SynAir-G

SynAir-G for the International Day of Clean Air for blue skies

The International Day of Clean Air for blue skies is an initiative organised by the United Nations Environment Programme since 2019, aiming at increasing awareness of the hazards caused by air pollution, and the effects on environmental health on humans, strengthening the common efforts to improve air quality. This year’s theme, #TogetherForCleanAir, calls attention to the urgent need for stronger partnerships, increased investment, and shared responsibility to address air pollution.

TogetherForCleanAir

In full alignment with this year’s theme, SynAir-G, together with the other 6 projects part of the IDEAL Cluster, is fostering multidisciplinary partnerships and international research, with the common intent to learn more about indoor air pollution and develop innovative solutions to improve air quality in schools and other indoor spaces, to improve the health and wellbeing of children and, eventually, improve the quality of outdoor air, reducing air pollution.

Air pollution and Health

Air pollution causes annually approximately 7 million premature deaths from strokes, heart failures, COPD, lung cancer and acute respiratory infections. Besides the deadly effects on humans, air pollution is a driver for climate crisis and damages nature and ecosystems; and adversely affects food security, social and gender parity, and economic development.

Air pollution particularly affects women, children and the elderly, as they are often exposed to high levels of ambient air pollution and indoor air pollution. Air pollution is linked to premature birth, low birth weight, and even infant mortality. These noxious effects can be brought to adolescence and adulthood, leading to asthma or other respiratory infections, cognitive effects, cancer or obesity. (Brumberg et al. (2021)).

For children who spend a large part of their day in schools, is essential that schools provide safe environments and clean indoor air.  But this is not always the case: severe indoor air quality problems in schools are frequently caused by poor building construction and maintenance, poor cleaning, and poor ventilation (Annesi-Maesano et al. (2013)). Moreover, outdoor pollution plays also a role, since air enters schools through windows, doors and ventilation systems.

Therefore is crucial to continue investigating and researching the different causes of air pollution, developing new, easy-to -use and accessible ventilation technologies.

SynAir-G for Clean Air

SynAir-G is investigating the interaction between the different pollutants in schools, and the related health effects on children at school. It will ultimately create a comprehensive and personalised user-friendly solution to monitoring indoor air quality, and proposals for possible interventions and an improved regulatory framework.

This will be achieved through the attentive work of SynAir-G partners, who work on different steps of the research, from the detection of air pollutants in schools to the study of their health effects of air pollutants, developing more effective detectors and air purifiers.

The SynAir-G project will contribute to science and policy to identify new standards to promote better indoor air quality and eventually improve the overall quality of air, for cleaner air and bluer skies.

 

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On the 6^th of  July 2023, the SynAir-G Coordinator was invited as a speaker to represent the  IDEAL Cluster at the 7th WHO Ministerial Conference on Health and Environment in Budapest. Prof. Nikos Papadopoulos presented the relevant role of the cluster in raising awareness and reducing the risk of the most important sources of air pollution.

The session was organised by European Commission Directorate-General for Research and Innovation (DG RTD), and promoted by the European Commission, Directorate-General for the Environment (DG ENV), European Environment Agency (EEA), and Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), which was also the moderator of the panel.

The panel showcased the outcomes of four large-scale collaborative initiatives and their potential to inform policy implementation measures, including the indoor air quality cluster.

Nikos Papadopoulos promoted the role of IDEAL Cluster in “citizen’s empowerment in breathing clean air indoors. On this matter, IDEAL provides data, proposes standards and policies and generates air monitoring and air-improvement solutions with direct impact on health”.

Additionally, he also showcased the relevant role of IDEAL Cluster on raising greater public awareness and reducing risks of the most important sources of air pollution.

All in all, the session highlighted the extensive framework of initiatives under the EU’s Green Deal aimed at protecting public health from the impacts of environmental degradation. It also brought together different EU-funded research initiatives which could answer pressing policy questions on how to tackle the impact of environmental pollution on people’s health.

Lastly, the participation of IDEAL Cluster and SynAir-G was a precious opportunity to shed light on the importance of the development of technologies to prevent the side effects of indoor air pollution, and the role of SynAir-G and IDEAL Cluster in it.

Do you want to stay in touch with SynAir-G activities? Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn, and subscribe to the SynAir-G Newsletter!

SynAir-G’s approach to Indoor Air Quality

 

The 5^th of June is World Environment Day (WED). Led by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), World Environment Day is the largest global event for environmental public outreach. On this day millions of people across the world join efforts to raise awareness on the environmental challenges and advocate to protect and restore the Earth.

The SynAir-G project aims to reveal and quantify synergistic interactions between different pollutants affecting health, from mechanisms to real life, focusing on the school setting. Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) is highly susceptible to air pollutants, particularly the ones detected in schools.

It is important to know more about air pollutants, their sources, and their impact on children’s health. For instance, on average 8-year-old pupils spend around 1,000 hours per year at school and breathe 900 litres of air per hour. They also tend to breathe 30% more times more per minute than average adults, which implies a much frequent intake of air, and subsequently, at major risk of questionable air quality.

According to World Health Organisation, air pollution is defined as “contamination of the indoor or outdoor environment by any chemical, physical or biological agent that modifies the natural characteristics of the atmosphere”.

Indoor air pollutants have both indoor and outdoor origins. For instance, in a school setting, some indoor pollutants can be chalking dust created by their use on the blackboard, or a wall freshly painted. On the other hand, examples of outdoor air pollutants are more mainstream and can be visualised as the pollution caused by vehicles passing nearby the school, a school garden or a public street full of white poplar trees that produce high quantities of fluff.

Among the conditions exacerbated by air pollution there are allergies, asthma, atopic eczema, together with rhino conjunctivitis. Moreover, research studies have linked indoor air pollution in schools with a decrease in learning performance and academic execution of the children affected by it. One of SynAir-G’s objectives is to study the connection between the dynamics of indoor air pollutants (sources, routes of exposure, dispersion), including interactions between indoor and outdoor spaces.

In detail, SynAir-G plans to use an ample range of sensors that can accurately and concurrently survey the vast assortment of chemical and biological pollutants. In parallel, the project will continue to obtain and detail the relevant health outcomes, considering the appropriate population collecting in real-life settings (in schools in 5 different countries) and covering multiple socioeconomic backgrounds in Europe. If needed, this data will combine in a multi-sensing platform.

Therefore, SynAir-G expects to build robust scientific evidence about synergies between air pollutants and allergens in indoor spaces, and boost interest and highlight the relevance of research on indoor air quality and allergens in public spaces. Simultaneously, it foresees to implement of informed and preventative European policies addressing air quality in schools; and setting up clear guidelines on how to create cleaner indoor spaces in schools. SynAir-G ultimately envisages, with its work, to increase awareness of the impact of indoor quality on education and reduce the risk of exacerbations in schools for students living with asthma and allergy.

SynAir-G will develop & execute an effective dissemination/communication strategy focused on visionary scientific research, to impact the lives of EU citizens and try to turn the future into reality with active involvement of all partners.

 

Sources:

1. Annesi-Maesano, I., Hulin, M., Lavaud, F., Raherison, C., Kopferschmitt, C., de Blay, F., André Charpin, D., Denis, C., 2012. Poor air quality in classrooms related to asthma and rhinitis in primary schoolchildren of the French 6 Cities Study. Thorax 67 (8), 682–688. https://doi.org/10.1136/thoraxjnl-2011-200391.
2. Baloch, R. M., Maesano, C. N., Christoffersen, J., Banerjee, S., Gabriel, M., Csobod, É., … Szuppinger, P. (2020). Indoor air pollution, physical and comfort parameters related to schoolchildren’s health: Data from the European SINPHONIE study. Science of The Total Environment, 139870. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139870.
3. Daisey, J.M., Angell, W.J., Apte, M.G., 2003. Indoor air quality, ventilation and health symptoms in schools: an analysis of existing information. Indoor Air 13 (1), 53–64. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1034/j.1600-0668.2003.00153.x.
4. European Commission, European Education and Culture Executive Agency, De Lel, G. (2021). The organisation of school time in Europe – Primary and general secondary education: 2021/22, Publications Office of the European Union, page 3. https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2797/63021.
5. com, 15 November 2022, What Is a Normal Respiratory Rate for Adults and Children?, https://www.healthline.com/health/normal-respiratory-rate#normal-rate-in-kids.
6. Hibbert, M. E., Couriel, J. M., & Landau, L. I. (1984). Changes in lung, airway, and chest wall function in boys and girls between 8 and 12 yr. Journal of applied physiology: respiratory, environmental and exercise physiology, 57(2), 304–308. https://doi.org/10.1152/jappl.1984.57.2.304
7. Hulin, M., Simoni, M., Viegi, G., Annesi-Maesano, I., 2012. Respiratory health and indoor air pollutants based on quantitative exposure assessments. Respir. J. 40 (4), 1033–1045. https://doi.org/10.1183/09031936.00159011.
8. Ramachandran, G., Adgate, J.L., Banerjee, S., Church, T.R., Jones, D., Fredrickson, A., Sexton, K., 2005. Indoor air quality in two urban elementary schools—measurements of airborne fungi, carpet allergens, CO2, temperature, and relative humidity. J. Occup. Environ. Hyg. 2 (11), 553–566. https://doi.org/10.1080/15459620500324453.
9. Siskos, P.A., Bouba, K.E., Stroubou, A.P., 2001. Determination of selected pollutants and measurement of physical parameters for the evaluation of indoor air quality in school buildings in Athens, Greece. Indoor Built Environ. 10 (3–4), 185–192. https://doi.org/10.1177/1420326X01010003
10. World Health Organisation (2023) Air Pollution, https://www.who.int/health-topics/air-pollution#tab=tab_1.

Synair-G advocating for asthma patients

Asthma is one of the most common chronic diseases in Europe, affecting 30 million children and young adults in Europe. Asthma can appear at any age, although it very often starts in childhood and teenage years. Given the impact and severity of this disease it is fundamental to better understand its causes and work towards prevention, particularly in childhood. 

SynAir-G aims to reveal and quantify synergistic interactions between different pollutants affecting health, from mechanisms to real life, focusing on the school setting and children living with asthma and allergy. 

In 2023, SynAir-G  promotes the World Asthma Day, an event organized by the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) to raise awareness of Asthma worldwide.

Visit the SynAir-G website to know more about indoor air quality and lives of children asthma patients.

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