Preface to the special grouping of papers from the 18th Annual Conference of the Center for Community Modeling and Analysis System

摘要

An estimated 4.2 million premature deaths globally are influenced by ambient air pollution, mainly from heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and lung cancer, besides attributing another 4 million pediatric asthma cases each year (Achakulwisut et al. 2019; Cohen et al. 2017; World Health Organization 2016). In 2017, nearly one in every 10 deaths worldwide was associated with air pollution. In the U.S. alone, air pollution contributed to 107,500 deaths (4% of all-cause mortality) in 2017. Outdoor air pollution originates from both natural and anthropogenic sources. While natural sources contribute substantially to local air pollution in regions more prone to forest fires and dust storms, the contribution to adverse public health impacts of pollution from human activities generally far exceeds that from natural sources. Pollutants with the strongest evidence for public health concern such as particulate matter (PM), ozone (O_3), nitrogen dioxide (NO_2) and sulfur dioxide (SO_2) have been regulated through establishment of protective ambient air quality standards (U.S. EPA 2020). Although significant progress has been made in developed countries to improve air quality during the last several decades, ambient pollution continues to adversely affect both human health and the environment from the neighborhood to the global scale. Furthermore, the natural processes that remove pollutants from the atmosphere can lead to ecosystem degradation due to enhanced loadings of nitrogen, sulfur, and phosphorous.