Bridging Air Pollution Measurements and Health Outcomes: Pathways, Exposure, and Risk Assessment

Air pollution science occupies a central position at the interface of atmospheric science, exposure assessment, and public health. Despite several decades of monitoring ambient air quality, significant challenges remain in translating environmental measurements into meaningful estimates of individual and population-level health risks. Key issues involve discrepancies between ambient concentrations and actual personal exposure, pronounced spatial and temporal variability within urban environments, differences between indoor and outdoor exposure contexts, and the influence of social, demographic, and biological vulnerability factors. Efforts to integrate atmospheric monitoring data with epidemiological approaches are frequently hindered by methodological heterogeneity, inconsistencies in exposure metrics, and disciplinary divides. Nevertheless, recent technological and methodological advances—such as low-cost sensor networks, satellite-based remote sensing of atmospheric pollutants, high-resolution dispersion and chemical transport modelling, and large prospective cohort health studies- are progressively reducing these gaps. These developments offer significant opportunities to refine exposure–response characterization and enhance qualitative health risk assessment frameworks. Nevertheless, important scientific and operational challenges remain, particularly regarding harmonization of exposure metrics, causal inference, and policy translation.This Research Topic aims to advance an integrated scientific framework for evaluating air pollution exposure pathways and their corresponding health consequences. By combining high-resolution pollutant measurements—including particulate matter of varying sizes, gaseous pollutants, ultrafine particles, and black carbon—with real exposure modelling and epidemiological health outcome data, the objective is to support comprehensive and quantitative risk assessment approaches. A particular emphasis is placed on the unified study of exposure and health, moving beyond descriptive accounts to enable precise estimation of exposure-response functions, disease burden, and policy-relevant health risk indicators.This Research Topic focuses specifically on the direct quantification of air pollution–related health risks through the integration of environmental measurements and epidemiological evidence. Contributions that do not directly address exposure–health linkages or risk quantification fall outside the scope.We welcome submissions addressing, but not limited to, the following areas:• Short and long-term exposure to PM₁, PM₂.₅, PM₁₀, NO₂, O₃, SO₂, and ultrafine particles.• Sources, measurement, and health impacts of black carbon.• Personal exposure assessment and microenvironmental monitoring methodologies.• Cohort and time series studies evaluating impacts on respiratory, cardiovascular, and neurological health.• Burden of disease estimation and attributable risk modelling.• Identification of susceptible and vulnerable populations and investigation of health inequities.• Integration of environmental monitoring datasets with epidemiological and health registries.• Policy-relevant frameworks for quantitative risk assessment and evaluation. Topic editors: Mounia TAHRI, Abdelfettah Benchrif, Salwa K. Mohamed Hassan Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/78622/bridging-air-pollution-measurements-and-health-outcomes-pathways-exposure-and-risk-assessment