An ad hoc committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will identify emerging scientific and technological advances from across a broad range of disciplines that EPA’s Office of Research and Development (ORD) should consider in its research planning to support EPA’s mission for protecting human health and the environment. In addition, the committee will recommend how ORD could best take advantage of those advances to meet current and future challenges during the next 10-20 years.
In carrying out its study, the committee will consider EPA’s mission, strategic planning documents, and current initiatives, as well as other broader topics including, but not limited to, biotechnology, data science (along with artificial intelligence and machine learning), climate impacts, environmental monitoring and sensors (outdoor and indoor), and impacts of stressors on ecological and human health. The committee also will consider advances that help EPA better incorporate systems thinking into multimedia, interdisciplinary approaches.
For the scientific and technologic advances it identifies for consideration by ORD, the committee will indicate each particular advance’s level of maturity and applicability to issues relevant to EPA’s mission, so that ORD may prioritize its approach in responding to the committee’s recommendations. The committee will consider the tools ORD has available (intramural research, extramural grants, cooperative agreements, interagency agreements) in recommending how ORD might incorporate those advances into its research and development enterprise. The committee’s report will build on relevant past reports, including the National Academies report: “Science for Environmental Protection: The Road Ahead.”