NASEM Seeks Nominations for Experts for Committee on Anticipatory Research for EPA’s ORD to Inform Future Environmental Protection

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) are now assembling an ad hoc committee to identify emerging scientific and technological advances from across a broad range of disciplines that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Research and Development (ORD) should consider in its research planning to support EPA’s mission for protecting human health and the environment.  In addition, according to NASEM, the committee will recommend how ORD could best take advantage of those advances to meet current and future challenges during the next 10 – 20 years.  NASEM states that the committee will consider EPA’s mission, strategic planning documents, and current initiatives, as well as other broader topics, including, but not limited to, biotechnology, big data, climate impacts, environmental monitoring and sensors, impacts of stressors on ecological and human health, and artificial intelligence and machine learning.  The committee also will consider advances that help EPA better incorporate systems thinking into multimedia, multidisciplinary approaches.

The study will be carried out by a committee of approximately 16 volunteer experts from a wide range of disciplines that can be applied to current and emerging environmental challenges facing society, including:

• Physical, chemical, biological, environmental, and social sciences;
• Exposure science;
• Public health;
• Aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems;
• Engineering;
• Informatics/information technology;
• Risk assessment;
• Risk management;
• Environmental policy decision-making;
• Communication and application of scientific information in environmental decision-making; and
• Emerging science and technology.

Nominations for committee members and reviewers are due August 5, 2020.