New RFA for 2018–2020 now available! Closing Date: February 17, 2017Request for Applications (RFA): “National Indoor Environments Program: Reducing Public Exposure to Indoor Pollutants”U.S. EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation (OAR), Indoor Environments Division (IED) has posted a new RFA (EPA-OAR-ORIA-17-02) here, www.epa.gov/grants/air-grants-and-funding, and here, www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=290725. EPA expects to make between 10 and 20 awards. …
And it will change how we think about construction here on Earth. Source: Genetically Engineered Bacteria Will Get Construction Jobs on Mars | Inverse Not 100% sure what to think of this story but it certainly is interesting. The basic summary: Jacqueline Ronson has written an article for Inverse about work by a group from Newcastle …
Interesting thoughts on the Built Environment by MASS Design group (https://massdesigngroup.org). Their film, “Design that Heals” just screened at the Architecture and Design Film Festival in NYC. Watch the trailer below: MASS Design is interested in the long term effects of architecture on communities and the environment, and focuses on creating built spaces that are thoughtfully …
Worth checking this out I think. Source: Contributions of pioneering women in indoor environment and health – Nazaroff – 2016 – Indoor Air – Wiley Online Library From the introduction: On occasion, this journal has recounted historical achievements in the indoor air sciences. Sundell[1] provided a broad-ranging overview. I have written about the history of …
Department of Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering and Department of Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering, College of Engineering Applications are invited for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in the field of Sustainable Buildings with a primary appointment in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering and a joint appointment in the Department of Food, …
There is a really nice new paper out in mSystems (full disclosure – I am on the Board of Editors of the journal). The paper is from Brent Stephens and sums up a recent presentation of his. See What Have We Learned about the Microbiomes of Indoor Environments? Abstract: The advent and application of high-throughput …
So both Hal Levin and I have posted and/or commented on the topic of plants “cleaning” the air in buildings. Most of what’s out there is either anecdotal or based on an old NASA study that would require hundreds of plants in a home to make any appreciable difference. Here’s a couple microBEnet posts on …
Microbes and the built environment sensu stricto This short review in Trends in Microbiology is open access, very relevant for this blog, and received quite some press. Review: Buildings, Beneficial Microbes, and Health – Jordan Peccia, Sarah E. Kwan – Trends in Microbiology (OA) Bacteria and fungi in buildings exert an influence on the human …
This last winter, Gwynne Mhuireach at the University of Oregon taught a really interesting course entitled “Human Health and the Design of the Urban Microbiome”. She posted a description of the final “design charrette” here on microBEnet awhile back. I just asked her if she’d be willing to share her course materials for others interested …
Imagine a city skyline — what do you see? Skyscraper peaks, metallic sheens, sand-colored stones, rusty brickreds, dirty white plaster, glinting windows? That is a lot of surface area! I am curious about what can be eking out a living on all of these different surfaces, and how it might be contributing to urban ecosystems. In …
