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Use Case Champion

Stephen Edwards, UL Research Institutes

Chirag Patel, Harvard University

Status

As of February 6, 2026

  • Use Case meets as needed.
  • Currently working to publish manuscript and does not accept new members.

Purpose

The purpose of this use case is to explore how harmonized language can help answer the question, “What are the biological processes and biomarkers associated with exposure and how do they relate to the potential for an adverse outcome associated with a given exposure?” This use case will build on other use cases by adopting their interim results and providing feedback on the ability to apply their outputs to this specific study.

The main goal of this use case is assessing data science tools and knowledge bases for their utility in digitizing relationships between exposures, biomarkers, and disease outcomes, focusing on PM2.5 exposure and airway-related disease outcomes as a test case. Specific items include:

  • Extending the semantic description of the exposure event to explicitly include measurements as previously done for adverse outcome pathways (AOPs).
  • Semantic linking of the exposure event to adverse outcomes by connecting the perturbed biological processes with toxicity mechanisms.
  • Supporting the integration of existing data and resources (e.g., ‘omics measurements, adverse outcome pathways).

Progress to Date

  • Established that the common theme across all use cases would be “air pollution and asthma” to anchor discussions to a specific example.
  • Refined the conceptual model based on workgroup feedback in April 2023.
  • Mapped the exposure and biological pathways for asthma-related respiratory effects following exposure to particulate matter to the working conceptual model using example papers from the EPA’s 2019 Particulate Matter (PM) Integrated Science Assessment (ISA).
  • Session "Overcoming Barriers to More Scalable Environmental Health Science Research via Harmonized Language" for the 2024 Society of Toxicology (SOT) Annual Meeting was accepted (Co-chairs: Stephen Edwards and Andrew Rooney).
  • Finalized manuscript and prepared it for submission to target journal in 2026.

Expected Final Products

  • Conceptual model based on syntheses of the prior literature that links potential sources of particulate matter to human exposures and biological responses and outcomes related to asthma and its subtypes.
  • Publication that details the work of this use case. Working Title: Enabling Machine-Based Relationship Discovery Between Exposures, Biomarkers, and Clinical Outcomes.
  • Semantic description of the conceptual model in computer-readable form.
  • Definition for a general scientific vocabulary capable of supporting the semantic description of the source to outcome model.

How to Get Involved

Biomarkers and Biological Processes Use Case is finalizing a manuscript and not accepting new members. Email [email protected] or [email protected] to be added to the EHLC listserv and receive updates on the use cases, events, and other EHLC resources.