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Frequent Questions
Frequent Questions:
1. What is the Children’s Centers program?
2. How is the program funded?
3. How many Centers are being funded, and where are they located?
4. What is the primary research focus of each Center?
5. What are the Children’s Centers finding out about how air pollutants and other environmental factors may affect the development of asthma and respiratory symptoms and how can I protect my child from these effects?
6. Can prenatal exposure to pesticides have an impact on the future health of my child?
7. What are the Children’s Centers finding out about the role of environmental factors in autism?
8. Where can I find news articles about the work of the Children’s Centers?
9. Where can I find examples of the materials the Children’s Centers are using to present public health information to their local communities?
10. Who can I contact for further information about the program or the work of a particular Center?
11. Where can I find other information from EPA about how to protect children from the effects of environmental exposures that may affect their health, and information provided by EPA for parents and children?
12. Where can I find information about other EPA research on environmental exposures and children's health?
Answers:
1. What is the Children’s Centers program?
Because they are still developing, children can be especially vulnerable to the effects of environmental exposures. To better understand the effects of children’s exposures and to explore ways to reduce their risks from substances in the environment, the Centers for Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research (Children’s Centers) were first funded in 1998 by EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). The Centers are investigating the effects of environmental exposures including pesticides, lead, mercury and PCBs and their role in childhood disorders such as asthma, autism and learning disabilities. The Centers apply community-based participatory research (CBPR) principles with the goal of understanding and ultimately preventing children’s exposure to environmental hazards and health disparities.
The Children’s Centers employ integrated multidisciplinary approaches to understand the complex risk factors that impact children’s health from the molecular and cellular level up to the systems level. Several of the Centers are conducting pioneering research investigating the role of gene-environment interactions in childhood diseases. The Centers are also developing innovative ways to investigate the role of environmental stressors. Most of the Centers focus on economically disadvantaged populations and communities of color.
Since 1998, EPA and NIEHS have evenly split the cost of this research program. However, the most recent center, the Southern Center on Environmentally-Driven Disparities in Birth Outcomes at Duke University, is being funded entirely by EPA.
3. How many Centers are being funded, and where are they located?
There have been a total of 14 Children’s Centers in the program so far, and there are 11 Centers currently funded. Six of the original (1998) Centers were re-funded for five additional years of research in 2003 (Columbia, Johns Hopkins, Mount Sinai, UC Berkeley, University of Washington and USC/UCLA). For individual Center locations, see the Center Locations map and clicking on each location takes you to each individual Center page. Two of the Centers, Harvard and the University of Illinois, have their study sites located at a distance from their academic institutions – the Harvard site is in Tar Creek, Oklahoma while the University of Illinois study site is in northeastern Wisconsin. For contact information for an individual center or the program administrators, please see the Center Contacts page.
4. What is the primary research focus of each Center?
Primary Exposures |
Primary Outcomes |
Center Location |
Air Pollutants |
Asthma and Respiratory Disease |
University of Iowa (1998-2004) |
Air Pollutants |
Asthma, Growth and Development, Respiratory Disease |
|
Environmental and Genetic Factors |
Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders |
|
Environmental, Social and Host Factors |
Birth Outcomes |
|
Lead and Mercury |
Neurodevelopment |
U. of Cincinnati (2001-2006) |
Mercury and PCBs |
Neurodevelopment |
|
Metal Mixtures – including lead, mercury, cadmium and iron |
Neurodevelopment, Growth, Psychological Stress |
|
Pesticides |
Growth and Development |
|
Pesticides, PCBs, Endocrine Disruptors |
Growth and Development |
Additional information is shown on the Research Areas page and on each individual Center page, which you can access from the drop-down menus in the Site Navigation box you’ll find on each page of this site. In a separate drop-down menu, you’ll find links to this information grouped by research topics such as air pollution and asthma, autism and developmental disorders and children’s exposure to pesticides.
5. What are the Children’s Centers finding out about how air pollutants and other environmental factors may affect the development of asthma and respiratory symptoms and how can I protect my child from these effects?
A number of the Children’s Centers are researching how air pollutants in the environment may affect respiratory symptoms and the development of asthma. For example, the USC/UCLA Children’s Center has found that children living in highly polluted areas of southern California were nearly five times as likely to have clinically lower lung function than children living in low-pollution communities, with the most affected children having only 80 percent of normal lung capacity. The Columbia Children’s Center found that exposure to traffic-related air pollutants at an early age may increase allergic immune responses, leading to respiratory symptoms. The Johns Hopkins Children’s Center has found that fine particulate matter (PM) reacts with the body’s immune system to induce an inflammatory response in the lung, and has tested a combination of behavioral and physical interventions such as installing high efficiency particulate air filters (HEPA filters) which were associated with a modest reduction in daily asthma symptoms, while the University of Michigan Center found that interventions including asthma education, HEPA-filtered vacuum cleaners , integrated pest management (IPM) improved measures of lung function and reduced the frequency of respiratory symptoms. While some studies have found a protective effect for children living in farming communities (the “hygiene hypothesis”) the University of Iowa Center found a prevalence of asthma in rural areas similar to that of urban areas. For more information, see Air Pollutants and Asthma page and the individual Center pages below.
Centers with a primary research focus in this area:
- Columbia University Center for Children’s Environmental Health
- Johns Hopkins Center for the Asthmatic Child in the Urban Environment
- U. of Iowa Children’s Environmental Airway Disease Center (1998-2004)
- University of Michigan Center for the Environment and Children’s Health (1998-2005)
- USC/UCLA Children’s Environmental Health Center
6. Can prenatal or early childhood exposure to pesticides have an impact on the future health of my child?
Yes. Documented effects in children of exposure to certain pesticides include poorer growth and altered brain and nervous system development. Researchers from the Columbia and UC Berkeley Children’s Centers have shown that blood and urine specimens from pregnant women in both urban and agricultural environments show measurable levels of pesticides, suggesting that the fetus can be exposed to these chemicals during early development. The University of Washington Center has shown that children in farmworker families or living in agricultural areas are particularly vulnerable with median house dust concentrations of organophosphate (OP) pesticides seven times higher than in the homes of reference families. OP pesticides were once commonly used in the home but in 2000-2001 were banned for residential use, in part due to work by the Columbia and Mount Sinai Centers. They are still widely used in agriculture, however.
Several of the Centers (University of Washington, UC Berkeley and Mount Sinai) have collaborated on research showing that newborns and young children show broad variability in sensitivity to OP pesticides (up to 160-fold) due to variations in a gene for an enzyme that detoxifies these chemicals in the body. The Mount Sinai Center showed that babies exposed in utero to OP pesticides are smaller at birth, and the Columbia Center showed average birth weight decrements of 6.6 ounces for pregnant women exposed to OPs, while exposure in the study population was greatly reduced after the EPA residential ban on these chemicals. The Columbia Center has shown that children prenatally exposed to OPs are significantly more likely to experience delay in both psychomotor and cognitive development at 36 months of age and are more likely to show other symptoms of altered neurodevelopment, including ADHD and pervasive personality disorder. The Mount Sinai Center found that children whose mothers had been exposed to DDE, a byproduct and metabolite of DDT, had diminished IQ up to age 17.
In terms of preventing exposure to these chemicals, the Columbia and Mount Sinai Centers have shown that building-wide integrated pest management (IPM) is effective at reducing children’s exposures to pesticides and is cost-effective over the long term. As a result of their research, the City of New York has adopted a new policy implementing IPM in public housing throughout the city.
For more information, see the Topic page on Children’s Exposures to Pesticides and Related Health Outcomes.
Centers with a primary research focus in this area:
- Columbia University Center for Children’s Environmental Health
- Mount Sinai Center for Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research
- University of California, Berkeley Center for Children’s Environmental Health Research
- University of Washington Center for Child Environmental Health Risks Research
7. What are the Children’s Centers finding out about the role of environmental factors in autism?
The majority of cases of autism seem likely to arise from a combination of as-yet unidentified genetic and environmental factors. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 1 in 150 U.S. children have some form of autism (also referred to as Autism Spectrum Disorders, or ASD). Surveys in the state of California indicate an apparent 210% increase in the cases of profound autism in children diagnosed over the last 10 years. There is growing concern from parents and health professionals that prenatal and postnatal exposure to xenobiotic factors (such as mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, halogenated aromatics, and pesticides) and biotic factors (such as vaccine antigens) may act synergistically with susceptibility-genetic factors to produce ASD. Two of the Children’s Centers are focusing their research on this important area of children’s health.
The University of California, Davis (UC Davis) Center for the Study of Environmental Factors in the Etiology of Autism launched the first large-scale epidemiological study of environmental factors in the etiology of autism, the CHARGE Study, comparing groups of children with autism with those that have metal retardation or developmental delay but not autism, and typically developing children. The Center has found that exposure to noncoplanar polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) significantly alters the brain’s threshold for seizures, which is significant because children with ASD are known to have a high rate of seizure disorder. Another finding provides a biologically plausible link between PCBs and neurotoxic effects in humans exposed during early development. The Center has also shown an association with elevated leptin levels and early onset autism. Research at the UC Davis Center has also connected exposure to thimerosal (ethyl mercury) to immune system dysfunction in mice, and has identified several aspects of immune system dysfunction in patients with autism compared with typically developing children. The Center’s research examines molecular mechanisms underlying neurodevelopmental disorders associated with human autism and animal models of autism and is aiming to identify how neurotoxicants of concern to children’s health influence the development of brain regions such as the amygdala and how they can influence social behavior.
The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) Center for Childhood Neurotoxicology and Assessment is examining the effects of environmental chemicals on autism and neurobehavioral development. The UMDNJ Center has developed animal models of features of autism such as regression of neurobehavioral function and has been examining how the developing nervous system responds to a variety of environmental chemicals known to affect the neuronal cell cycle, adhesion and repulsion proteins and neuronal migration. The Center has also found that exposure of cells in the laboratory to lead enhanced nerve cell outgrowth and cell survival, and this has implications for autism because autistic children show increased postnatal head growth. Through clinical studies of children with autism, the UMDNJ Center has examined whether regression or loss of neurobehavioral function may be related to exposure to environmental neurotoxins, perhaps in combination with specific genetic predispositions, creating a gene-environment interaction, to determine if such children are uniquely susceptible to environmental chemicals. The UMDNJ Center has found that some autistic children show increased susceptibility to chemical-induced neurobehavioral problems, and that some children with autism are unable to metabolize certain fatty acids that help the body fight inflammation, which can then cause damage to the brain and other organs. UMDNJ Children’s Center researchers have discovered possible ways to detect biological risk factors for autism through urine and blood tests and have patented an experimental treatment for autism which is still in the early testing phase.
- UC Davis Center for Children's Environmental Health
- UMDNJ Center for Childhood Neurotoxicology and Assessment
8. Where can I find news articles about the work of the Children’s Centers?
On the Newsroom page, you’ll find summaries of news articles about the work of the Centers, with links to the full text versions.
9. Where can I find examples of the materials the Children’s Centers are using to present public health information to their local communities?
See the Education Factsheets section.
10. Who can I contact for further information about the program or the work of a particular Center?
You can find contact information for the Principal Investigator (PI) of each Center and the Children's Centers program administrators at EPA and NIEHS on the Center Contacts page. If you'd like to make a comment about the site, have further questions that haven't been answered here or would like to send a message to the Children's Centers program administrator at EPA, you can use the form on the page labeled Contact Us.
11. Where can I find other information from EPA about how to protect children from the effects of environmental exposures that may affect their health, and information provided by EPA for parents and children?
EPA established the Office of Children's Health Protection (OCHP) in 1997 to make the protection of children's health a fundamental goal of the Agency. For more information, go to http://www.epa.gov/children and also see the page on What You Can Do to Protect Children from Environmental Risks (also offered in Spanish, Vietnamese and Chinese versions).
For EPA's website designed for use by parents and young children, including games, pictures and stories about how to explore your environment and how to protect it, see the EPA Environmental Kids Club website at http://www.epa.gov/kids.
EPA also has websites geared towards environmental education for grades 5-8, grades 9-12, teachers, researchers and scientists. For an overview, go to http://www.epa.gov/enviroed/index.html.
12. Where can I find information about other EPA research on environmental exposures and children's health?
The National Center for Environmental Research (NCER) administers the STAR (Science to Achieve Results) and other EPA grant programs supporting research on how environmental exposures can affect children's health. View all NCER grant searches for Children's Health
Centers Funded By: 