Translator Exposure APIs: Open Access to Data on Airborne Pollutant Exposures, Roadway Exposures, and Socio-Environmental Exposures and Use Case Application

Alejandro Valencia, Lisa Stillwell, Stephen Appold, Saravanan Arunachalam, Steven Cox, Hao Xu, Charles P. Schmitt, Shepherd H. Schurman, Stavros Garantziotis, William Xue, Stanley C. Ahalt and Karamarie Fecho
Additional contact information
Alejandro Valencia: Environmental Sciences and Engineering Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA
Lisa Stillwell: Renaissance Computing Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA
Stephen Appold: Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA
Saravanan Arunachalam: Institute for the Environment, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA
Steven Cox: Renaissance Computing Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA
Hao Xu: Renaissance Computing Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA
Charles P. Schmitt: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC 27709, USA
Shepherd H. Schurman: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC 27709, USA
Stavros Garantziotis: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC 27709, USA
William Xue: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC 27709, USA
Stanley C. Ahalt: Renaissance Computing Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA
Karamarie Fecho: Renaissance Computing Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, USA

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 14, 1-13

Abstract: Environmental exposures have profound effects on health and disease. While public repositories exist for a variety of exposures data, these are generally difficult to access, navigate, and interpret. We describe the research, development, and application of three open application programming interfaces (APIs) that support access to usable, nationwide, exposures data from three public repositories: airborne pollutant estimates from the US Environmental Protection Agency; roadway data from the US Department of Transportation; and socio-environmental exposures from the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. Three open APIs were successfully developed, deployed, and tested using random latitude/longitude values and time periods as input parameters. After confirming the accuracy of the data, we used the APIs to extract exposures data on 2550 participants from a cohort within the Environmental Polymorphisms Registry (EPR) at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, and we successfully linked the exposure estimates with participant-level data derived from the EPR. We then conducted an exploratory, proof-of-concept analysis of the integrated data for a subset of participants with self-reported asthma and largely replicated our prior findings on the impact of select exposures and demographic factors on asthma exacerbations. Together, the three open exposures APIs provide a valuable resource, with application across environmental and public health fields.

Keywords: airborne pollutants; roadway exposure; demographic factors; socio-economic factors; asthma; asthma exacerbations; open data; application programming interfaces; environmental health; public health (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/14/5243/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/14/5243/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:14:p:5243-:d:387298

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().