ABSTRACT
This chapter builds on a framework for exposure science adapted from the National Academy of Science (NAS) report “Exposure Science in the 21st Century” (NRC, 2012). This framework reflects a broad view of the role of exposure science in human and ecosystem health protection. The major elements of this expanded framework are identified, such as sources of stressors, environmental intensity (such as pollutant concentrations), time–activity and behavior, contact of stressors and receptors (which we term the “exposure moment”), and outcomes of contact (see Figure 13.1). This framework also highlights the role of upstream human and natural factors, and demonstrates the roles of both external and internal environments within exposure science while maintaining that exposure is measured at some boundary between the source and receptor. Here dose represents the amount of material that passes or otherwise has influence across the boundary to come into contact with the target system, organ, or cell to produce an outcome. This framework also recognizes the feedbacks inherent in exposure science such as how a diseased person changes behavior to influence their subsequent exposure. The normative goals of exposure assessment underlying this framework are to understand human health effects of stressors and to minimize contact with those stressors. A nascent goal is to understand the effects of beneficial or salutogenic stressors (such as contact with green space) for public health protection. Core elements of exposure science https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781315610252/8fb43be8-57b3-489c-adbf-d6caa9891cb4/content/fig13_1_B.jpg" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> Source: Reprinted with permission from Exposure Science in the 21st Century: A Vision and a Strategy, 2012 by the National Academy of Sciences, Courtesy of the National Academies Press, Washington, D.C. (NRC, 2012).
