Peer Review Committee (PRC)

This page last reviewed January 21, 2010

A Peer Review Committee (PRC) was appointed by the University of California at Berkeley to independently evaluate the scientific basis of proposed revisions to current methodologies. Six experts were selected to review the proposed methodology for estimating premature deaths associated with long-term exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5). The committee members' areas of research expertise included health effects associated with air pollution, analysis of epidemiological data, atmospheric chemistry, and air quality risk management.

The peer reviewers received a draft report dated August 23, 2007 and evaluated whether ARB staff correctly interpreted the results published in the literature and correctly developed methods for estimating premature deaths associated with public exposures to ambient PM. The committee provided staff with written comments, which staff addressed and incorporated into a draft report released to the public for comment on May 22, 2008.

• Jeffrey Brook, Ph.D.
  Environment Canada
  Adjunct Professor
  Public Health Sciences/Chemical Engineering
  University of Toronto

• Mark D. Eisner, M.D., M.P.H.
  Associate Professor
  Pulmonary and Critical Care Division
  UC San Francisco

• Richard C. Flagan, Ph.D. Professor
  Chemical Engineering/Environmental Science and Engineering
  California Institute of Technology

• Alan Hubbard, Ph.D.
  Assistant Professor
  Biostatistics
  UC Berkeley

• Joel Kaufman, M.D., M.P.H.
  Professor
  Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences
  University of Washington

• Joel Schwartz, Ph.D.
  Professor
  Environmental Health/Epidemiology
  Harvard University

For more information on the Peer Review Committee, please contact Dr. Linda Smith at (916) 327-8225.

PM Health Impacts Methodology