Twenty scientists and engineers at the 91探花 are among the 38 new members elected to the Washington State Academy of Sciences for 2021, according to a July 15 . New members were chosen for 鈥渢heir outstanding record of scientific and technical achievement, and their willingness to work on behalf of the Academy to bring the best available science to bear on issues within the state of Washington.鈥�

Current academy members selected 29 of the new members. An additional nine were elected by virtue of joining one of the National Academies.

New 91探花members who were elected by current academy members are:

• , professor and Port of Tacoma Chair in Environmental Science at 91探花Tacoma, director of the and science director of the , 鈥渇or foundational work on the environmental fate, behavior and toxicity of PCBs.鈥�
• , professor of psychology, 鈥渇or contributions in research on racial and gender inequality that has influenced practices in education, government, and business鈥� and 鈥渇or shifting the explanation for inequality away from individual deficiencies and examining how societal stereotypes and structures cause inequalities.鈥�
• , professor of chemistry and member faculty at the , 鈥渇or leadership in the innovative synthesis and chemical modification of nanoscale materials for application in light emission and catalysis.鈥�
• , professor of global health and of environmental and occupational health sciences, and founding director of the , 鈥渇or work on the health impacts of climate change, on climate impact forecasting, on adaptation to climate change and on climate policy to protect health.鈥�
• , professor of environmental and forest sciences and dean emeritus of the College of the Environment, 鈥渇or foundational studies of regional paleoenvironmental history and sustained excellence in academic leadership to catalyze and sustain transformative research and educational initiatives.鈥� Graumlich is also president-elect of the American Geophysical Union.
• Dr. , the Joseph W. Eschbach Endowed Chair in Kidney Research and co-director of the , 鈥渇or pioneering contributions and outstanding achievements in the development of the novel wearable artificial kidney, as well as numerous investigator-initiated clinical trials and multi-center collaborative studies.鈥�
• , professor of environmental chemistry and chair of the Physical Sciences Division at 91探花Bothell, 鈥渇or leadership in monitoring and understanding the global transport of atmospheric pollutants from energy production, wildfire, and other sources, as well as science communication and service that has informed citizens and enhanced public policy.鈥�
• , professor and chair of psychology, 鈥渇or contributions demonstrating how psychological science can inform long-standing issues about racial and gender discrimination鈥� and 鈥渇or research that has deep and penetrating implications for the law and societal efforts to remedy social inequities with evidence-based programs and actions.鈥�
• , the Leon C. Johnson Professor of Chemistry, member faculty at the and chair of the Department of Chemistry, 鈥渇or developing new spectroscopy tools for measuring energy flow in molecules and materials with high spatial and temporal resolution.鈥�
• , professor of astronomy, 鈥渇or founding the and leading the decades-long development of the interdisciplinary modeling framework and community needed to establish the science of exoplanet astrobiology鈥� and 鈥渇or training the next generation of interdisciplinary scientists who will search for life beyond Earth.鈥�
• , professor and chair of aeronautics and astronautics, 鈥渇or leadership and significant advances in nonlinear methods for integrated sensing and control in engineered, bioinspired and biological flight systems鈥� and 鈥渇or leadership in cross-disciplinary aerospace workforce development.鈥�
• , associate professor of chemistry and member faculty with the Molecular Engineering and Sciences Institute, 鈥渇or exceptional contributions to the development of synthetic polymers and nanomaterials for self-assembly and advanced manufacturing with application in sustainability, medicine and microelectronics.鈥�
• Dr. , Associate Dean of Medical Technology Innovation in the College of Engineering and the School of Medicine, the Graham and Brenda Siddall Endowed Chair in Cornea Research, and medical director of the 91探花Eye Institute, 鈥渇or developing and providing first class clinical treatment of severe corneal blindness to hundreds of people, for establishing the world premier artificial cornea program in Washington, and for leading collaborative research to translate innovative engineering technologies into creative clinical solution.鈥�
• Dr. , professor of medicine and director of the , 鈥渇or global recognition as an authority on drug and vaccine development for viral and parasitic diseases through work as an infectious disease physician and immunologist.鈥�
• Dr. , professor of pediatrics and of anesthesiology and pain medicine, and director of the , 鈥渇or outstanding leadership in pediatric anesthesiology and in the care of children with traumatic brain injury鈥� and 鈥渇or internationally recognized expertise in traumatic brain injury and direction of the Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center for the last decade as an exceptional mentor and visionary leader.鈥�

91探花members who will join the Washington State Academy of Sciences by virtue of their election to one of the National Academies are:

• , professor of biostatistics, 鈥渇or the development of novel statistical models for longitudinal data to better diagnose disease, track its trajectory, and predict its outcomes鈥� and 鈥渇or revolutionizing how dynamic predictors are judged by their discrimination and calibration and has significantly advanced methods for randomized controlled trials.鈥� Heagerty was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2021.
• , the Bill and Melinda Gates Chair in Computer Science and Engineering, 鈥渇or foundational contributions to the mathematics of computer systems and of the internet, as well as to the design and probabilistic analysis of algorithms, especially on-line algorithms, and algorithmic mechanism design and game theory.鈥� Karlin was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
• , professor emeritus of applied mathematics and data science fellow at the , 鈥渇or inventing key algorithms for hyperbolic conservation laws and transforming them into powerful numerical technologies鈥� and 鈥渇or creating the Clawpack package, which underpins a wide range of application codes in everyday use, such as for hazard assessment due to tsunamis and other geophysical phenomena.鈥� LeVeque was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
• , the Benjamin D. Hall Endowed Chair in Basic Life Sciences and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, 鈥渇or advancing our physical understanding of cell motility and growth in animals and bacteria鈥� and 鈥渇or discovering how the pathogen Listeria uses actin polymerization to move inside human cells, how crawling animal cells coordinate actomyosin dynamics and the mechanical basis of size control and daughter cell separation in bacteria.鈥� Theriot was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
• , professor and chair of biological structure, 鈥渇or elucidating cellular transformations through which neurons pattern their dendrites, and the interplay of activity-dependent and -independent mechanisms leading to assembly of stereotyped circuits鈥� and 鈥渇or revelations regarding the fundamental principles of neuronal development through the application of an elegant combination of in vivo imaging, physiology, ultrastructure and genetics to the vertebrate retina.鈥� Wong was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.

New members to the Washington State Academy of Sciences are scheduled to be inducted at a meeting in September.

With wildfire smoke driving down air quality across much of the western U.S. this week, it’s important to protect yourself from smoky air. Health officials recommend staying indoors, keeping windows and doors shut, and wearing a mask if you have to go outside聽to reduce exposure to the significant health risks of wildfire smoke.

If you don’t have air conditioning or an air purifier in your home, it’s possible to make your own inexpensive purifier using a standard 20-inch box fan and filter available at hardware stores or online. These filters can help remove harmful smoke particles, which are very small and can enter our lungs and cause short- and long-term health problems.

Dan Jaffe is a professor of atmospheric and environmental chemistry at 91探花Bothell who studies wildfire smoke, wildfire plumes and global transport of pollutants. He recently demonstrated to 91探花News how to make your own home air purifier.

“I’ve been testing these and I’ve found in a small room, like an office or a small bedroom, I can go from pretty dirty air, turn this on, and within an hour that room is cleaned up to healthy levels of air quality,” Jaffe said.

He added it’s a good idea to turn off the fan when you leave the room.

Older homes often “leak” air more than newer homes, meaning that smoke can easily enter the building even if doors and windows are shut.

Importantly, inequalities in our communities mean that not every home provides good protection from smoke, and many workers in disadvantaged populations can鈥檛 afford to stay home, said聽, assistant professor of epidemiology in the 91探花School of Public Health.

鈥淲e know that disadvantaged communities tend to live in older housing and more crowded housing,” Hajat said. “The messaging we get from public health says we need to stay indoors, but, if you’re living in a home that’s pretty leaky, then you’re getting minimal protection from staying indoors. So poorer and minority communities who tend to live in older homes will be less protected from wildfire smoke.鈥�

Learn more about how to make your own home air purifier on . Read about how wildfires disproportionately harm poorer communities here.

More information on smoke and wildfires:

• More 91探花experts on smoke impacts and wildfires

A 91探花 Bothell study now shows that this strong offshore pattern also influenced air quality. The climate pattern increased ozone levels above Washington, Oregon, western Utah and northern California, according to published Feb. 15 in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.

“Washington and Oregon was really the bullseye for the whole thing, because of the location of the winds,” said lead author , a professor of atmospheric sciences at the 91探花 Bothell. “Salt Lake City and Sacramento were on the edge of this event, but because their ozone is typically higher, those cities felt some of the more acute effects.”

The other author is , a postdoctoral researcher at 91探花Bothell.

The study finds that terrestrial effects of the high-pressure system that produced “the blob” 鈥� warm temperatures, low cloud cover and calmer air 鈥� were the perfect ingredients to produce ozone. Ozone levels in June 2015 were between 3 and 13 parts per billion higher than average over the northwestern United States. The pattern pushed ozone concentrations in Salt Lake City and Sacramento above federally allowed limits.

Ozone is an invisible component of smog that is a secondary pollutant formed by a chain reaction. Cars, factories and other sources emit pollution into the atmosphere. Solar rays then provide the spark for chemical reactions that produce the three linked oxygen atoms of ozone. This molecule is hazardous to human health and is subject to federal regulations.

Jaffe’s research group has been measuring ozone since 2004 atop Mount Bachelor in central Oregon to tease apart the sources of ozone and other pollutants, such as forest fires, transport of pollution from overseas and domestic pollution from the United States. In June 2015, members noticed a spike in ozone above any previous measurements.

“At first we were like ‘Whoa, maybe we made a mistake.’ We looked at our sensors to see if we made an error in the calibration. But we couldn’t find any mistakes,” Jaffe said. “Then I looked at other ozone data from around the Pacific Northwest, and everybody was high that year.”

Jaffe’s measurements are from the 91探花’s in central Oregon. Members of his group use the ski hill’s lifts for transportation and electrical power to support year-round measurements at the 9,000-foot peak. Air is pulled with vacuum pumps into a room to be sampled by a variety of instruments in the summit’s lift house.

The June 2015 ozone levels at the observatory were 12 parts per billion higher than the average of previous observations for that time. Jaffe learned that air quality managers in Sacramento and Salt Lake City had several times recorded eight-hour averages above the 70 parts per billion limit set by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

“This was a very widespread phenomenon going all the way to California,” Jaffe said. “Managers saw that air quality was violating the air quality standards on many days, and they didn’t know why.”

The new study analyzes larger-scale climate data to show that the areas that recorded higher-than-normal ozone were the same regions that had high temperatures, weak winds and low cloud cover.

“Ultimately, it all links back to the blob, which was the most unusual meteorological event we’ve had in decades,” Jaffe said. “Temperatures were high, and it was much less cloudy than normal, both of which trigger ozone production. And because of that high-pressure system off the coast, the winds were much lower than normal. Winds blow pollution away, but when they don’t blow, you get stagnation and the pollution is higher.”

The paper also finds an effect from higher biogenic emissions, the scented emissions from trees and plants that contain natural ozone-producing particles.

The study focuses on June 2015 because the wildfire season began in July and dominated conditions in the later summer. Jaffe’s group is exploring that effect in a separate project.

While it is generally understood that warmer temperatures will favor ozone production, Jaffe said, this study suggests that broader-scale climate patterns also play a role in air quality and human health.

“Our environmental laws need to be written with an understanding that there’s a lot of variability from one year to the next, and with an understanding of the long-term path of where we’re heading under climate change,” Jaffe said. “This work helps us understand the link between climate variability and air quality, and it can give us an idea of what to expect as our planet continues to warm.”

The study was funded by the National Science Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

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For more information, contact Jaffe at 425-352-5357 (office) or djaffe@uw.edu.

NSF: AGS 1447832, NOAA: RA-133R-16-SE-0758

With that support , an atmospheric science professor at 91探花Bothell, and four undergraduate students from the Seattle and Bothell campuses spent recent months sampling the air near the tracks that go to the proposed West Coast export terminals.

Jaffe will present first results from the study in a at 7 p.m. Monday, Nov. 4 at 91探花Bothell. The results measure the amount of small- and medium-sized particles released by different types of trains in Seattle and in the Columbia River Gorge. He will give a second, more technical presentation of the results at the 91探花Seattle campus Friday, Nov. 22 at 3:30 p.m. in Johnson Hall 75.

The project began in April when Jaffe, frustrated by the lack of funding through traditional channels, put his research proposal on the crowd-funding website , by two 91探花graduates as a kind of Kickstarter dedicated to science research.

“There’s been a lot of questions and controversy about whether coal trains leak coal dust into the air,” Jaffe said. “I thought there were important scientific questions that needed to be answered.”

With help from a column in the and a from Cliff Mass, 91探花professor of atmospheric sciences, the project surpassed its funding goal, raising just over $20,500 in a week and a half. Jaffe used the extra money to add a second sampling site.

During the summer and fall the team sampled more than 500 trains, including passenger trains, trains carrying coal and other types of freight trains. The device bought for the project sampled air near the tracks, while a weather gauge tracked the wind direction and other variables and a webcam recorded the type of train passing by.

The team sampled for about a month at a North Seattle home near railroad tracks carrying coal north, one of about 20 locations offered by project supporters, Jaffe said. The team also sampled for about 10 days at a Columbia River Gorge site near tracks that carry trains west over the Cascade Mountains.

Four undergraduates tested all the equipment, developed the computer programs, put the instruments out in the field and checked on them periodically. They worked with Jaffe to analyze the data and identify the amount of small- and medium-sized air particles present as trains passed by.

The team is preparing to submit the findings to an open-access journal in atmospheric sciences, but Jaffe said he felt it was important to share preliminary results during the 2013 calendar year so that they could be useful in the current environmental assessment process.

“I want this study to inform the community, industry and those who are making the decision to increase coal train traffic through our region,” Jaffe said. “These preliminary findings should be a wake-up call that this region needs more in-depth research on the air quality impact, and funding for that research, in order to make a more informed decision.”

Crowd-funding the project meant working on a shoestring budget, under intense public scrutiny, and in this case with a tight timeline. But if there was no other funding source, Jaffe would do it all again.

“It strikes me as unusual that we have major public-policy decision taking place in an absence of information,” Jaffe said. “So would I do another? I guess I would.”

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For more information, contact Lisa Hall, public information officer at 91探花Bothell, at 425-352-5461 or lhall@uwb.edu. Contact Jaffe at 425-352-5357 or djaffe@uw.edu.

The six-week , through July 15, includes scientists from more than 30 different institutions. Together they are studying how pollutants combine with natural vegetation emissions to affect climate and air quality in the Southeastern U.S.

Despite some thunderstorms the campaign is going well, said , an atmospheric sciences professor at 91探花Bothell. He is coordinating air measurements aboard a C-130 military transport plane operated by the National Science Foundation and the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

“We’re getting some very exciting data,” Jaffe said.

Flights out of Smyrna, Tenn., have gone as far as eastern Texas and central Pennsylvania, and above the coal-fired power plants of the Ohio River Valley. This week flights will go to the Atlantic coast and down to the Gulf of Mexico.

Jaffe leads a group conducting the first airborne survey of mercury emissions from U.S. coal plants. The multi-institutional team is deploying new instruments that can measure different forms of mercury from the ground all the way up into the upper atmosphere. Researchers hope to learn how to model mercury levels and forecast the effects of regulations.

“There鈥檚 a lot of uncertainty in the sources of mercury 鈥� where it comes from and how it gets into the ecosystems,” Jaffe said. “If you don鈥檛 have a good handle on the sources of mercury in your tuna fish, it鈥檚 hard to get a handle on the regulations.”

At the research base outside Nashville, , a 91探花professor of atmospheric sciences, has been running weather and pollution forecasts to help the team decide a few days beforehand where and when to fly to sample different kinds of air. Depending on the day the team may be sampling pollution plumes above cities such as Houston or Birmingham, Ala., or clean sea air.

In recent years Jaegl茅 has developed theoretical models of how mercury moves from its source, reacts in the atmosphere and eventually ends up in the oceans and in the rain.

“But we have had very few observations,” Jaegl茅 said. “Now with these direct aircraft observations we can start questioning the theory and figure out what processes are missing, and what processes are correct.”

Meanwhile , a 91探花associate professor of atmospheric sciences, is studying the dark side of molecules that give boreal forests their distinctive pine scent. On hot, sunny days the nitrogen oxides from tailpipes and smoke stacks react with those pine-scented molecules to produce ground-level ozone, otherwise known as smog.

Plant emissions and pollution also can combine to form light-colored aerosols that reflect sunlight. Some people think this explains why the Southeast has experienced less warming in recent decades than the rest of the country.

A device developed in Thornton’s lab is flying on the P-3 “hurricane hunter” military aircraft operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. A second identical instrument sits at a forest field station in Centreville, Ala. Both capture precise measurements of vegetation particles, pollution, and combinations of the two.

Thousands of chemical reactions make particles appear or disappear, Thornton said. Understanding even one of those compounds requires a broad approach.

“The more variables that are measured simultaneously, the better,” Thornton said. “Large, collaborative field campaigns, where many meteorological and chemical variables are measured together, are the best way to make progress.”

Other research groups this summer are collecting measurements on the ground, taking simultaneous measurements with two smaller planes, and using a 150-foot-tall structure to sample within and above the forest canopy.

“I’m sure this will lead to many years of research, analyzing all these different measurements that we will have collected,” Jaegl茅 said.

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For more information, contact Jaffe at 425-352-5357 or djaffe@uw.edu, Jaegl茅 at 206-685-2679 or 箩补别驳濒茅蔼耻飞.别诲耻, and Thornton at 206-543-4010 or joelt@uw.edu.