Workshop
The Roundtable on Population Health Improvement of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine hosted a public workshop on September 19, 2019 titled Models for Population Health Improvement by Health Care Systems and Partners: Tensions and Promise on the Path Upstream. The term upstream refers to the higher levels of action to improve health. Medical services act downstream (i.e., at the patient level) in improving population health, while such activities as screening and referring to social and human services (e.g., for housing, food assistance) are situated midstream, and the work of changing laws, policies, and regulations (e.g., toward affordable housing, expanding healthy food access) to improve the community conditions for health represents upstream action.
The workshop explored the growing attention on population health, from health care delivery and health insurance organizations to the social determinants of health and their individual-level manifestation as health-related social needs, such as patients' needs. The workshop showcased collaborative population health improvement efforts, each of which included one or more health systems. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop.
94 pages
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ISBN Paperback: 0-309-26532-0
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-26545-2
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/26059
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. Models for Population Health Improvement by Health Care Systems and Partners: Tensions and Promise on the Path Upstream: Proceedings of a Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Active shooter drills have become a standard practice in nearly all U.S. schools, yet their potential impact on students and educators has received limited attention. School Active Shooter Drills: Mitigating Risks to Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Health explores how these drills are conducted and how to reduce potential harm while supporting school safety. Developed by a committee of experts in education, school safety, public health, pediatrics, child and adolescent development, psychiatry, psychology, neuroscience, public policy, and criminology, this report provides an in-depth review of current practices and offers guidance. The report provides suggestions for implementing practices that promote prevention and preparedness while supporting well-being, and foster learning environments where students and staff feel safe, capable, and supported.
School Active Shooter Drills finds that while drills aim to enhance preparedness, they often vary dramatically in intensity and design, from simple safety walk-throughs to unannounced, high-simulation events. Such inconsistencies can heighten anxiety, distress, and confusion, especially among vulnerable student populations. The report underscores that developmentally appropriate, trauma-informed practices are essential, and drills involving realistic simulations or deception should be avoided entirely.
School Active Shooter Drills outlines actionable recommendations for state and local policymakers, school leaders, researchers, and federal agencies, including banning harmful practices, supporting staff training, ensuring equitable inclusion, and increasing access to mental health resources. This report also calls for national guidance and sustained research to strengthen the evidence base and help schools foster safe, inclusive, and supportive learning environments so that schools not only prepare students and staff for emergencies but also protect their mental, emotional, and behavioral well-being.
422 pages
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ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99198-6
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99199-4
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29105
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. School Active Shooter Drills: Mitigating Risks to Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Health. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Workshop
The National Academies' Roundtable on Plastics convened a workshop in May 2025 to explore circularity and other approaches for sustainable life cycle management of plastic materials to mitigate plastic pollution, including reduction of plastic waste through redesign, reuse, remaking, and recycling. This workshop specifically addressed areas of both high plastic production and waste, namely packaging, textiles, and building material sectors. Throughout, participants considered solutions including rethinking, redesign, and reuse; the use of these synergies and strategies to minimize impacts on plastic waste; and the associated effects on human and environmental health.
76 pages
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ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99455-1
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99456-X
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29199
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Circularity and Plastics: Proceedings of a Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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The field of solar and space physics explores the heliosphere - the vast protective bubble formed by the solar wind that extends from the Sun to the outer fringes of the solar system, and beyond. This booklet highlights key themes and recommendations from the 2025 decadal survey for solar and space physics, The Next Decade of Discovery in Solar and Space Physics: Exploring and Safeguarding Humanity's Home in Space.
40 pages
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99359-8
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29150
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Solar and Space Physics for the Nation: An Overview of the 2024–2033 Decadal Survey. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Low-level electrical fault currents are a phenomenon found in direct current (DC) traction systems used in public transit systems worldwide. These low-level currents are typically caused by small and sporadic failures of insulation within the electrification system, which makes them difficult to locate, measure, and control. If these faults are left undetected, existing evidence shows extensive damage to infrastructure of transit systems and that of adjacent private/public utilities could result.
TCRP Research Report 259: Low-Level DC Leakage and Fault Currents in Transit Systems: Developing a Prototype for Detection and Mitigation, from TRB's Transit Cooperative Research Program, develops a prototype system that can detect low-level faults in electrified transit systems powered by third rails.
The report is supplemental to TCRP Research Report 211: Guidebook for Detecting and Mitigating Low-Level DC Leakage and Fault Currents in Transit Systems.
36 pages
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ISBN Paperback: 0-309-59935-0
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-59936-9
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29246
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Low-Level DC Leakage and Fault Currents in Transit Systems: Developing a Prototype for Detection and Mitigation. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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The U.S. scientific enterprise has produced countless discoveries that have led to significant advances in technology, health, security, safety, and economic prosperity. However, concern exists that excessive, uncoordinated, and duplicative policies and regulations surrounding research are hampering progress and jeopardizing American scientific competitiveness. Estimates suggest the typical U.S. academic researcher spends more than 40 percent of their federally funded research time on administrative and regulatory matters, wasting intellectual capacity and taxpayer dollars. Although administrative and regulatory compliance work can be vital aspects of research, the time spent by researchers on such activities continues to increase because of a dramatic rise in regulations, policies, and requirements over time.
To better ensure that the research community is maximally productive while simultaneously ensuring the safety, accountability, security, and ethical conduct of publicly funded research, Simplifying Research Regulations and Policies: Optimizing American Science examines current federal research regulations. This report identifies ways to improve regulatory processes and administrative tasks, reduce or eliminate unnecessary work, and modify and remove policies and regulations that have outlived their purpose while maintaining necessary and appropriate integrity, accountability, and oversight. Simplifying Research Regulations provides a roadmap for establishing a more agile and resource-effective regulatory framework for federally funded research.
142 pages
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99579-5
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99580-9
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29231
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Simplifying Research Regulations and Policies: Optimizing American Science. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Traffic safety public awareness and education efforts are two countermeasures that traffic safety professionals, including those working at state highway safety offices (SHSOs), employ to improve roadway user safety. These efforts are intended to share messaging that will raise awareness of dangerous roadway behaviors, increase knowledge of the impact of these behaviors and safer alternatives, change attitudes about both those behaviors and the alternatives, and ultimately, change those behaviors.
BTSCRP Research Report 14: Evaluating Traffic Safety Campaigns: A Guide, from TRB's Behavioral Traffic Safety Cooperative Research Program, provides insights into current practices for measuring the effectiveness of behavioral-based traffic safety campaigns. It also presents a framework for evaluating traffic safety campaigns, with the goal of designing and conducting future campaigns to more effectively promote safer road user behaviors.
152 pages
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99370-9
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99371-7
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29154
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Evaluating Traffic Safety Campaigns: A Guide. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Behavioral outreach is a compelling option for improving traffic safety, because it presents a relatively low-cost and broad-based way for highway safety offices to discourage unsafe behaviors and encourage safe behaviors without requiring the same logistics and resources as deploying enforcement or changing infrastructure.
BTSCRP Web-Only Document 7: Objectives, Components, and Measures of Effective Traffic Safety Public Awareness and Education Efforts, from TRB's Behavioral Traffic Safety Cooperative Research Program, identifies current practices used by state highway safety offices (SHSOs) and other entities to evaluate the effectiveness of traffic safety campaigns and associated outcomes. The document also includes a practical and scalable framework for evaluating efforts to engage road users, through traffic safety campaigns, to change behavior and improve safety performance.
150 pages
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8.5 x 11
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99374-1
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29155
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Objectives, Components, and Measures of Effective Traffic Safety Public Awareness and Education Efforts. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Every community across the United States faces impacts on their health and well-being from a wide range of sources including pollution of air, water, and soil and extreme events such as wildfires and other natural or human-caused disasters. Impacts may be heightened by factors such as unaffordable housing, limited or no access to healthcare, poverty, and unemployment. Cumulative impact assessment (CIA) is a tool to help environmental and other relevant decision-makers consider multiple factors in evaluating priorities and potential changes in policies or regulations, with a focus on improving health and well-being.
In response to a request from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), this report provides recommendations on the state of the science of CIA and on fostering its application at the community, state, regional, tribal, and national levels. On the basis of input gathered in a number of public meetings, the report recommends EPA expand its CIA framework in important conceptual ways, including to encompass multiple dimensions of health and well-being. Further, the factors that undermine health and well-being (stressors) should be distinguished from those that promote health and well-being (resources).
State of the Science and the Future of Cumulative Impact Assessment lays out an expanded, five-step process for cumulative impact assessment that is driven by ongoing meaningful engagement and includes a final step of monitoring and evaluation of decisions implemented. This report's authoring committee applied its recommended five-step process to eight case studies across different contexts and scales - including the region in Louisiana known as "cancer alley"; a tribal population in Colorado; the train derailment and chemical fire in East Palestine, Ohio; the Los Angeles, California wildfires; and the replacement of lead service lines across the nation - concluding that the recommendations can increase the effectiveness of actions to improve health and well-being.
276 pages
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99446-2
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-60061-8
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29182
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. State of the Science and the Future of Cumulative Impact Assessment. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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The affordability of health professional education (HPE) is a critical issue in the U.S., with rising costs and mounting debt impacting who can enter and sustain health professional careers. The National Academies Global Forum on Innovation in Health Professional Education convened a workshop series in early 2025 to examine financial barriers, assess workforce effects, and consider strategies to improve the value and accessibility of HPE. Policy experts, educators, students, and international stakeholders discussed topics such as financing and payment models that influence access to HPE programs; the impact of debt on students' decisions to enter primary care or practice in rural and underserved areas; and return on investment considerations for HPE programs and their implications for individuals, institutions, and society. This Proceedings of a Workshop-in Brief summarizes presentations and discussions that took place across the series.
11 pages
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-60045-6
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29271
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Affordability of Health Professional Education: Proceedings of a Workshop Series—in Brief. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Pedestrian fatalities in the U.S. have increased dramatically since 2010, with most of the rise occurring in dark conditions.
NCHRP Web-Only Document 430: Improving Pedestrian Safety at Night, from TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program, is supplemental to NCHRP Research Report 1157: Strategies to Improve Pedestrian Safety at Night: A Guide and summarizes the research from previous portions of this multiphase project.
197 pages
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99560-4
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29225
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Improving Pedestrian Safety at Night. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Walking is an important part of a healthy, sustainable transportation system. Yet walking is too often inaccessible, uncomfortable, or unsafe as a practical option for large numbers of people because of traffic risk, discomfort, or inconvenience. Multilane roadways, higher design and posted speeds, and a lack of safe and convenient pedestrian walking and crossing facilities and operations, even at known attractors such as bus stops and grocery stores, are consistently associated with pedestrian fatalities in the United States. The risk is much higher at night. Between 2018 and 2022, 76% of U.S. pedestrian crash fatalities occurred in darkness.
NCHRP Research Report 1157: Strategies to Improve Pedestrian Safety at Night: A Guide, from TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program, is a state-of-the-art resource for state departments of transportation on addressing the high pedestrian fatalities on their roadways, especially at night. The guide features strategies for transportation professionals to implement to directly enhance pedestrian safety at night and was informed by a multimethod study of pedestrian safety in darkness in the United States.
Supplemental to the report is NCHRP Web-Only Document 430: Improving Pedestrian Safety at Night.
80 pages
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8.5 x 11
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99555-8
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99556-6
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29224
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Strategies to Improve Pedestrian Safety at Night: A Guide. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Immunization Safety Office (ISO) is responsible for studying vaccine risks once vaccines are administered to the public. During the COVID-19 pandemic, ISO played a central role in vaccine safety evaluation.
At the request of the CDC, the National Academies convened an expert committee to assess the ISO's statistical and epidemiological methods in vaccine risk monitoring and evaluation, including processes designed to detect, evaluate, and report potential problems associated with COVID vaccines. The committee also evaluated CDC's external communication strategies and provided recommendations to sustain and enhance ISO's vaccine risk monitoring and communication systems. The resulting report presents the committee's conclusions and recommendations.
252 pages
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6 x 9
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-53979-X
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-59410-3
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29240
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Vaccine Risk Monitoring and Evaluation at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Full-depth reclamation (FDR) is a method to recycle in-place asphalt material for reconstruction and rehabilitation of flexible pavements.
NCHRP Synthesis 657: Full-Depth Reclamation: Current Practices, from TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program, documents practices used by state departments of transportation, including classification of FDR types, site selection, specifications and guidelines for FDR mix design, and test methods to evaluate FDR quality.
146 pages
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ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99545-0
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99546-9
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29222
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Full-Depth Reclamation: Current Practices. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Automatic vehicle monitoring (AVM) and vehicle health monitoring (VHM) are becoming more widely utilized by transit agencies across the United States. These agencies are increasingly interested in using predictive maintenance technology (PMT), artificial intelligence (AI), and other technologies, but the overall capabilities and benefits of these technologies are still emerging.
TCRP Synthesis 185: Use of Automatic Vehicle Monitoring, Vehicle Health Monitoring, and Diagnostic Systems by Transit Agencies, from TRB's Transit Cooperative Research Program, explores how AVM, VHM, and other technologies are utilized to monitor an array of onboard vehicle components in order to assist in the early identification of potential mechanical issues, thus supporting effective maintenance practices.
90 pages
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8.5 x 11
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99599-X
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99600-7
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29236
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Use of Automatic Vehicle Monitoring, Vehicle Health Monitoring, and Diagnostic Systems by Transit Agencies. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Rapid_expert_consultation
Diagnostics are the first line of defense to infectious disease outbreaks. The rapid spread of Influenza A (H5N1) or "Bird Flu" into U.S. dairy cattle, poultry, and humans underscores the urgent need for stronger diagnostic readiness. While sustained human-to-human transmission has not yet occurred with H5N1, the risk is growing. Currently there are knowledge gaps around early case identification measures, clinical management, and coordinated public health efforts.
In response, the National Academies produced a rapid expert consultation providing a strategic and actionable analysis for strengthening domestic diagnostic capacity and infrastructure. This is the first publication of the institution's new Rapid Response to Emerging Science, Engineering, and Medicine Challenges initiative, which provides a formal platform for proactively building sustainable, crosscutting rapid response capabilities.
36 pages
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8.5 x 11
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-60052-9
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29273
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Diagnostic Tools, Gaps, and Collaborative Pathways in Human H5N1 Detection: Rapid Expert Consultation. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Intergenerational mobility is an important measure of well-being that underlies a fundamental value: that anyone should be able to succeed economically based on their own merits, regardless of their circumstances. This has been a value held by many Americans throughout U.S. history, even as many observers may rightly argue that it has been, at times and for many groups, severely constrained. For all the emphasis placed on mobility in the United States, the chances Americans have of doing better than their parents and their chances of succeeding economically regardless of the advantages of birth are not higher than in other wealthy countries.
This report provides a forward-looking framework for data, research, and policy initiatives to boost upward mobility and better fulfill promises of opportunity and advancement for all members of U.S. society. The report focuses on key domains that shape mobility, including early life and family; the spaces and places where people live and work; postsecondary education; and credit, wealth, and debt. It also discusses the data infrastructure needed to support an extensive research agenda on economic and social mobility.
290 pages
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6 x 9
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-73039-2
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-73040-6
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/28456
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Economic and Social Mobility: New Directions for Data, Research, and Policy. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Workshop_in_brief
As the world faces unprecedented sustainability challenges, including biodiversity loss, resource depletion, and ecosystem degradation, there is a critical need for innovative, scalable, and data-informed solutions. Artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a transformative technology with the potential to accelerate progress toward sustainability goals by enhancing efficiency, optimizing resource use, improving environmental monitoring, and enabling data-informed decision-making.
To examine AI opportunities, challenges, and pathways through a lens of sustainability, the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine's Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability, in collaboration with the Board on Mathematical Sciences and Analytics and the Board on Human-Systems Integration convened a hybrid workshop on June 4, 2025. The workshop examined how AI can be leveraged to maximize benefits for the United States at the intersection of nature, people, and this critical technology. This Proceedings of a Workshop-in Brief provides a high-level summary of key discussions held during the workshop.
12 pages
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ISBN Ebook: 0-309-60027-8
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29267
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Artificial Intelligence for Sustainability: Maximizing Benefits for the United States: Proceedings of a Workshop—in Brief. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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Workshop
In April 2025, the Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences of the National Academies of Sciences Engineering, and Medicine convened a workshop to explore best practices for implementation and evaluation of suicide prevention grants programs. Presenters and participants discussed non-clinical community-based programs intended to mitigate the impacts of social determinants of health on suicide risk. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussion of the workshop.
142 pages
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6 x 9
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paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-99520-5
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-99521-3
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17226/29215
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2025. Development, Implementation, and Evaluation of Community-Based Suicide Prevention Grants Programs: Proceedings of a Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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