Harness Big Data for Health, Well Being and the Environment
Study shows COVID-19 vaccines provide lasting protections
January 12, 2022 A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine shows that, despite breakthrough infections, COVID-19 vaccines are highly effective at preventing hospitalization and death. The findings support the use of boosters to provide ongoing protection.
$12M NSF grant will establish nationwide atmospheric measurement network
December 15, 2021 Dr. Jason Surratt will serve as UNC's principal investigator on a large National Science Foundation-funded project to determine the content of airborne particulate matter, which has significant effects on health and climate change. He will oversee one of 12 research sites that, together, will form the Atmospheric Science and mEasurement NeTwork (ASCENT).
New research sheds light on microbial link between gut and brain in mammals
October 20, 2021 Microbes in the mammalian gut appear to play a major factor in the landscape of chemical processes in the body and may influence communication between the gut and the brain, according to new research from the lab of Dr. Kun Lu.
UNC researchers awarded $9.25 million to study DNA variance related to disease
September 30, 2021 Dr. Michael Love, assistant professor of biostatistics at the Gillings School, is a co-investigator on a new five-year project — part of the $185 million Impact of Genomic Variation on Function Consortium, which is funded by the National Institutes of Health.
Rethinking a century of fluid flows
July 1, 2021 Using the TCAT model, researchers are upending traditional methods of fluid flow calculation. Physics at this microscale provide a fundamental groundwork for solving problems that are of interest to society.
Taking more steps daily may lead to a longer life
May 20, 2021 Taking more steps per day, either all at once or in shorter spurts, may help you live longer, according to preliminary research to be presented at the American Heart Association’s Epidemiology, Prevention, Lifestyle & Cardiometabolic Health Conference 2021.
Predicting potential pitfalls of battery-driven power systems
May 14, 2021 Batteries could be critical in the transition to clean energy, but the same characteristics that make them attractive could enable users to exploit the electric power system for private profit while increasing overall costs and making grid management more difficult.
Obesity may slow progress against cancer deaths
May 12, 2021 Cancer death rates have fallen dramatically in the United States. Factor in obesity, however — as Gillings School researchers did, and the picture changes. A study published May 10 in JAMA Network Open reports that obesity-related cancer deaths are improving, but at a slowing pace.
“Geography of risk” impacts analysis of racial inequities in COVID-19 deaths
April 5, 2021 In a new commentary, Gillings School epidemiologists call for an approach to monitoring COVID-19 data that compares risks across racial and ethnic demographics in order to create a more equitable response to the pandemic.
New ozone air pollution maps support Global Burden of Disease study
March 8, 2021 New research led by UNC Gillings School students and faculty has mapped global ground-level ozone concentrations by year using a data fusion. This is the first time this method has been applied to ozone observations globally. The findings were used by the Global Burden of Disease 2019 study, which estimated that about 365,000 people around the world died in 2019 from exposure to ozone pollution.
