We’ve brought together researchers from all over Australia.

Fay Johnston is a public health physician and environmental epidemiologist. Her major work is in air quality and health, especially relating to the health impacts of bushfire smoke, biomass smoke, pollen and other airborne hazards. She is lead investigator of the Centre for Safe Air.

Guy Marks is a respiratory and public health physician, epidemiologist and Senior Principal Research Fellow at the Burnet Institute. Guy is a member of the Board of Directors of the NCD Alliance and the Federation of International Respiratory Societies (FIRS). He is a former member of the steering committee of the Global Asthma Network. He led the Centre for Air pollution, energy and health Research (CAR, an NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence) from 2012 to 2022. He is a Conjoint Professor (formerly Scientia Professor) at UNSW Sydney and an Honorary Professor at University of Sydney. His main research interests are in chronic respiratory disease (asthma and COPD), tuberculosis and protection from airborne hazards (both infectious and non-infectious). He is the former President and Executive Director of the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (The Union).

Lidia Morawska is a Distinguished Professor and Australian Laureate Fellow in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, at the Queensland University of Technology. She conducts fundamental and applied research in the interdisciplinary field of air quality and its impact on human health and the environment, with a specific focus on science of airborne particulate matter. Lidia has been involved at the executive level with a number of relevant national/international professional bodies, is a member of the Australian Academy of Science, Queensland Academy of Arts and Sciences, Royal Society of Biology and acting as an advisor to the World Health Organization. Lidia is Centre Director for the ARC Training Centre for Advanced Building Systems Against Airborne Infection Transmission (THRIVE) hosted at QUT.

Yuming Guo is Professor of Global Environmental Health and Biostatistics & Head of the Monash Climate, Air Quality Research (CARE) Unit. His research group focuses on environmental epidemiology, biostatistics, global environmental change, air pollution, climate change, urban design, residential environment, remote sensing modelling, and infectious disease modelling.

Shyamali Dharmage (MBBS, MSc, MD, PhD), trained in Clinical Medicine, Public Health & Epidemiology, leads the Allergy & Lung Health Unit at the University Of Melbourne. She is a world-recognised leader in Life Course Epidemiology of Allergies and Chronic Respiratory Diseases, and is ranked in the top 0.047% worldwide in the field of Obstructive Lung Diseases.

Sotiris Vardoulakis is Director of the Healthy Environments And Lives (HEAL) National Research Network and Professor of Environmental Public Health at the University of Canberra Health Research Institute. He is co-Director of the Clean Environment for Planetary Health in Asia, and the Clean Energy for Healthy Environments And Lives Partnerships. Previously he was Research Director at the Institute of Occupational Medicine in Edinburgh and Head of the Environmental Change Department at Public Health England. Vardoulakis’ research interests include climate change, air pollution, sustainable cities, exposure analysis, health impact assessment, environmental health policy and communication. He was a lead author of the first UK Climate Change Risk Assessment and the National Adaptation Plan. He is a Coordinating Lead Author of the UNEP Global Environmental Outlook 7 (Air Chapter).

Richard Norman is a Health Economist with ongoing interest in the economic evaluation of healthcare, the measurement and valuation of quality of life, discrete choice experiments and econometric analysis of large panel datasets. He holds an BA(Hons) in Philosophy and Economics and an MSc in Health Economics, both from the University of York in the UK, and a PhD from the University of Technology Sydney. He recently completed an NHMRC Early Career Research Fellowship to explore patterns and preferences around quality of life. He is a Chief Investigator on projects currently funded by the NHMRC and the ARC.

Geoff Morgan has more than 25 years experience in epidemiological research, as well as environmental health policy and education. His research in environmental epidemiology specialises in the use of state of the art biostatistical and geographical information system techniques applied to routinely collected health data linked to small area level socio-demographic and environmental risk factors. The results of his research have been translated into environmental health and health services policy and his current work includes epidemiological studies into: the health effects of smoke from various sources including bushfires and wood heaters; the health effects of climate including extreme events such as heatwaves; the relationship between the built environment and health. He has a joint appointment with the Sydney School of Public Health and the University Centre for Rural Health.

Luke Knibbs is Associate Professor, Epidemiology and Public Health Data Science, at the School of Public Health and Director, Public Health Research Analytics and Methods for Evidence (PHRAME), at Sydney Local Health District (SLHD). Luke has a multidisciplinary background in atmospheric science, epidemiology and geographic information systems. This has informed his long-standing interest, originally borne out of necessity, in harnessing large and/or high-dimensional data sets to answer questions on anthropogenic sources of environmental change and the exposures that may mediate effects on human health, including air pollution among others. The majority of recent work is focused on, and done in collaboration with colleagues in, low- and middle-income countries.

Professor Graeme Zosky is the Associate Dean Research Performance for the College of Health and Medicine at the University of Tasmania. Professor Zosky is an expert in the underlying mechanisms that drive the health effects of exposure to pollution, particularly inhaled particulates in community and occupational settings. Professor Zosky’s research program spans lab-based, epidemiological and clinical approaches to address public health challenges related to safe air.