Brent Stephens, Associate Professor of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, IL, presented this lecture to the students and guests on Thursday, February 16, 2017.

Speaker Biography: Dr. Brent Stephens is an associate professor in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at Illinois Institute of Technology where he teaches courses in Building Science, Building Enclosure Design, and Indoor Air Pollution. He has a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering and an M.S.E. in Environmental and Water Resources Engineering, both from the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Stephens and members of his Built Environment Research Group at Illinois Tech conduct research on energy and air quality in the built environment, primarily with field measurements in and around buildings. Their work continues to advance methods for assessing energy efficiency, indoor air quality, and environmental exposures within the built environment.

Abstract: Human exposure to airborne pollutants of outdoor origin, including airborne fine and ultrafine particulate matter (PM) and gases such as ozone (O3) and nitrogen oxides (NOx), is associated with a variety of adverse health effects in epidemiology studies. Most of these associations are made using measured or modeled outdoor pollutant concentrations. However, much of human exposure to many airborne pollutants of outdoor origin actually occurs indoors. This is because people in the U.S. and other industrialized countries spend nearly 90% of their time indoors, on average, and nearly 70% of their time at home. Further, outdoor pollutants can infiltrate and persist in buildings with widely varying efficiencies. Failing to account for indoor exposures to outdoor air pollutants can lead to widespread exposure misclassification and inaccuracies in epidemiology studies and can limit informed decision-making by building designers, engineers, occupants, and policymakers. In this talk, I will summarize the current state of our understanding of indoor exposures to outdoor pollutants and highlight recent research conducted by my Built Environment Research Group at Illinois Tech to better characterize and predict the fundamental mechanistic drivers of outdoor pollutant transport into buildings.