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Smoke exposure from bushfires, such as those experienced in Australia during 2019-2020, can reach levels up to 10 times those deemed hazardous. Short‐term and extended exposure to high levels of air pollution can be associated with adverse health…
Author(s): Clare M. Walter, Elena K. Schneider-Futschik, Luke D. Knibbs, Louis B. Irving
Year Published:

Significance: Wildfire emissions in the western United States have had increasingly larger impacts on air quality, health, and climate forcing in recent decades. However, our understanding of how wildfire plume composition evolves remains incomplete…
Author(s): Brett B. Palm, Qiaoyun Peng, Carley D. Fredrickson, Ben H. Lee, Lauren A. Garofalo, Matson A. Pothier, Sonia M. Kreidenweis, Delphine K. Farmer, Rudra P. Pokhrel, Yingjie Shen, Shane M. Murphy, Wade Permar, Lu Hu, Teresa L. Campos, Samuel R. Hall, Kirk Ullmann, Xuan Zhang, Frank Flocke, Emily V. Fischer, Joel A. Thornton
Year Published:

Field and laboratory emission factors (EFs) of wildland fire emissions for 276 known air pollutants sampled across Canada and the US were compiled. An online database, the Smoke Emissions Repository Application (SERA), was created to enable analysis…
Author(s): Susan J. Prichard, Susan M. O'Neill, Paige C. Eagle, Anne Andreu, Brian Drye, Joel Dubowy, Shawn P. Urbanski, Tara Strand
Year Published:

In the southern hemisphere summer of 2019–20, Australia experienced its most severe bushfire season on record. Smoke from fires affected 80% of the population, with large and prolonged exceedances of the Australian National Air Quality Standard for…
Author(s): Sharon L. Campbell, Penelope J. Jones, Grant J. Williamson, Amanda J. Wheeler, Christopher Lucani, David M. J. S. Bowman, Fay H. Johnston
Year Published:

Inhaling wildfire smoke can be harmful, but smoke from unintended wildfires may be worse than smoke from prescribed burns, according to a study published in 2019. That means the health risks from wildfires — like the ones that have destroyed…
Author(s): Casey Crownhart
Year Published:

Previous estimates of greenhouse gas emissions from Australian savanna fires have incorporated on-ground dead wood but ignored standing dead trees. However, research from eucalypt woodlands in southern Queensland has shown that the two pools of dead…
Author(s): Garry D. Cook, Adam C. Liedloff, Carl P. Meyer, Anna E. Richards, Steven G. Bray
Year Published:

Smoke emissions from wildland fires contribute to concentrations of atmospheric particulate matter and greenhouse gases, influencing public health and climate. Prediction of emissions is critical for smoke management to mitigate the effects on…
Author(s): Maureen C. Kennedy, Susan J. Prichard, Donald McKenzie, Nancy H. F. French
Year Published:

Prescribed fire is an important tool for maintaining the resilience of fire-dependent ecosystems. Despite broad recognition of its value, however, prescribed fire application in the western US has not been applied at the necessary levels. Past…
Author(s): Northwest Fire Science Consortium
Year Published:

Smouldering peat fires are reported across continents and their emissions result in regional haze crisis (large scale accumulation of smoke at low altitudes) and large carbon foot prints. Inorganic content (IC) and bulk density vary naturally in…
Author(s): Yuqi Hu, Wuquan Cui, Guillermo Rein
Year Published:

The Smoke and Roadway Safety Guide provides wildland fire personnel the tools and methods to effectively plan and forecast for roadway smoke impacts and to monitor, respond to, and mitigate smoke on roadways to reduce the risk to the public and fire…
Author(s): Gary M. Curcio, David Mueller, Peter Lahm, Mark Fitch, Joshua C. Hyde
Year Published:

Pioneering networks of cameras that can search for wildland fire signatures have been in development for some years (High Performance Wireless Research & Education Network-HPWREN cameras and the ALERT Wildfire camera). While these cameras have…
Author(s): Kinshuk Govil, Morgan L. Welch, Timothy Ball, Carlton R. Pennypacker
Year Published:

Broadband high-speed absorption spectroscopy using swept-wavelength external cavity quantum cascade lasers (ECQCLs) is applied to measure multiple pyrolysis and combustion gases in biomass burning experiments. Two broadly-tunable swept-ECQCL systems…
Author(s): Mark C. Phillips, Tanya L. Myers, Timothy J. Johnson, David R. Weise
Year Published:

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the potential for co-occurring wildfires pose health threats to people around the globe. Along with the direct impacts of wildfires, exposure to fine particulate matter (PM 2.5)—pollution composed of small inhalable…
Author(s): Francisca N. Santana, Stephanie L. Fischer, Marika O. Jaeger, Gabrielle Wong-Parodi
Year Published:

Wildland firefighters are directly exposed to elevated levels of wildland fire (WF) smoke. Although studies demonstrate WF smoke exposure is associated with lung function changes, few studies that use invasive sample collection methods have been…
Author(s): Chieh-Ming Wu, Anna M. Adetona, Chi Song, Luke P. Naeher, Olorunfemi Adetona
Year Published:

Using observations and model simulations (ESM 4.1) during 1988–2018, we show large year‐to‐year variability in western U.S. PM2.5 pollution caused by regional and distant fires. Widespread wildfires, combined with stagnation, caused summer PM2.5…
Author(s): Yuanyu Xie, Meiyun Lin, Larry W. Horowitz
Year Published:

Extreme wildfire events are becoming more common and while the immediate risks of particulate exposures to susceptible populations (i.e., elderly, asthmatics) are appreciated, the long-term health effects are not known. In 2017, the Seeley Lake (SL…
Author(s): Ava Orr, Cristi A. L. Migliaccio, Mary Buford, Sarah Ballou, Christopher T. Migliaccio
Year Published:

Central to public health risk communication is understanding the perspectives and shared values among individuals who need the information. Using the responses from a Smoke Sense citizen science project, we examined perspectives on the issue of…
Author(s): Mary Clare Hano, Steven E. Prince, Linda Wei, Bryan Hubbell, Ana G. Rappold
Year Published:

Wildland firefighters are exposed to health hazards including inhaling hazardous pollutants from the combustion of live and dead vegetation (smoke) and breathe soil dust, while working long shifts with no respiratory protection. This research brief…
Author(s): Kathleen M. Navarro, Linda Mutch
Year Published:

Background: Wildfire events are increasing in prevalence in the western United States. Research has found mixed results on the degree to which exposure to wildfire smoke is associated with an increased risk of mortality. Methods: We tested for an…
Author(s): Annie Doubleday, Jill Schulte, Lianne Sheppard, Matthew C. Kadlec, Ranil Dhammapala, Julie Fox, Tania M. Busch Isaksen
Year Published:

Particularly in rural settings, there has been little research regarding the health impacts of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) during the wildfire season smoke exposure period on respiratory diseases, such as influenza, and their associated…
Author(s): Erin L. Landguth, Zachary A. Holden, Jonathan M. Graham, Benjamin Stark, Elham Bayat Mokhtari, Emily Kaleczyc, Stacey Anderson, Shawn P. Urbanski, William Matt Jolly, Erin O. Semmens, Dyer A. Warren, Alan Swanson, Emily Stone, Curtis W. Noonan
Year Published: