EPA Awards $800,000 to UCSB to Research Effects of Chemical Exposure

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) has provided the University of California at Santa Barbara (“UCSB”) a grant of close to $800,000 to the model the ecological and toxicological impacts of chemicals in the environment. The grant is funded by the Science to Achieve Results (“STAR”) program. The STAR grants are part of EPA’s Chemical Safety for Sustainability research program’s efforts to develop new methods to improve chemical evaluation and support environmental sustainability. UCSB will use these funds to develop new mathematical models to predict patterns of exposure in humans and the environment to metals, nanoparticles and certain flame retardants in industrial and consumer products.

UCSB is among six universities nationwide given almost $4 million in funding to study the ecological impacts of manufactured chemicals. In addition to UCSB, Harvard University received funding to demonstrate how existing data and models can be integrated in a framework that links an initiating event to a regulatory outcome of interest. Michigan State University received funding to develop an adverse outcome pathway for neurological function in fish that can be used to predict effects of chemicals. The University of North Carolina at Wilmington received a grant to develop an estuarine and marine model for measuring ecological impacts of endocrine disrupting chemicals. Oregon State University received a grant to develop an approach to define adverse outcome pathways for flame retardants. And, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas received funding to develop an approach to predict individual-to-community level ecological effects of chemicals.