LKCMedicine hosts joint workshop on the Health Consequences of Air Pollution with Imperial College London

On 22 June, LKCMedicine, in collaboration with Imperial College London (Imperial), held a joint workshop on the consequences of air pollution. Attended by 100 participants from various institutions, including National Environment Agency (NEA) and National Healthcare Group (NHG), the workshop featured multiple experts across medicine, computing, and geography to discuss the consequences and mitigation strategies of air pollution.

 The workshop began with an introduction by the workshop’s moderators, LKCMedicine’s Assistant Professor and Provost’s Chair in Molecular Medicine Sanjay Chotirmall and Clinical Chair in Respiratory Medicine, National Heart & Lung Institute, Imperial Professor Wisia Wedzicha, who is also a Visiting Professor at LKCMedicine. Opening remarks were then given by NTU Singapore’s Senior Vice President for Health and Life Sciences and LKCMedicine Dean, Distinguished University Professor Joseph Sung, and Vice-Dean for International Activities and Professor of Clinical Endocrinology, Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London Professor Desmond Johnston. In the opening remarks, both Prof Sung and Prof Johnston highlighted the timeliness of having this workshop in light of increasing air pollution.

A series of short lectures then began on the following topics:

Air pollution: The science behind the rhetoric Professor Frank Kelly Battcock Chair in Community Health and Policy, Faculty of Medicine, School of Public Health, Imperial College London	Impact of pollution on lung disease: systems approach Professor Fan Chung Professor of Respiratory Medicine Faculty of Medicine, National Heart & Lung Institute, Imperial College London, Visiting Professor, LKCMedicine, NTU Singapore
Bioaerosols and environmental pollution The Perfect Storm? Professor Stephan Schuster President’s Chair in Genomics SCELSE Deputy Director (Facilities & Capacities) Research Director (Meta-‘omics & Microbiomes) Professor, Schools of Biological Sciences, NTU Singapore	Effect of Urbanization on Ozone and Resultant Health Effects Associate Professor Steve Yim Department of Geography and Resource Management, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong
The impacts of air pollution beyond heart & lung Dr Ian Mudway Senior lecturer, Faculty of Medicine, School of Public Health, Imperial College London	Multiscale green and thermal turbulent airflow modelling in urban environment Professor Chris Pain Professorial Research Fellow, Faculty of Engineering Department of Earth Science & Engineering, Imperial College London
Longitudinal Asian population cohorts for respiratory research at ICL-NTU-LKC Professor John Chambers President’s Chair of Cardiovascular Epidemiology Professor of Cardiovascular Epidemiology LKCMedicine, NTU Singapore Chief Scientific Officer, PRECISE	Air Quality Prediction and Smoke Detection via Machine Learning Professor Lin Weisi School of Computer Science and Engineering, NTU Singapore
Uptake and bioreactivity of airborne particles within the Respiratory tract Professor Terry Tetley Professor of Lung Cell Biology, Faculty of Medicine, National Heart & Lung Institute, Imperial College London	Exposome Analytics: From molecules to populations Professor Marc Chadeau – Hyam Professor of Computational Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Faculty of Medicine, Schools of Public Health, Imperial College London
Indoor Air Quality for Healthy Living Associate  Professor Ng Lee Ching Group Director (Environmental Health Institute) National Environmental Agency (NEA), Singapore	Air pollution and the Lungs Assoc  Professor John Abisheganaden Head & Senior Consultant Department of Respiratory & Critical Care Medicine Clinical Director, Case Management Unit Tan Tock Seng Hospital

 The series of lectures were then followed by a roundtable session, moderated by Asst Prof Chotirmall and Prof Wedzicha. Discussions focused on how NTU and Imperial College London can better collaborate, as well as finding strategies to address deteriorating air quality in a post-COVID-19 world. The workshop ended with closing addresses by Prof Johnston, and Professor Lim Kah Leong, President’s Chair in Translational Neuroscience and LKCMedicine Vice-Dean for Research. Both Prof Johnston and Prof Lim called for future collaborations and emphasised that support would be provided for this endeavour.