Assessing Human Exposure to Chemicals in Materials, Products and Articles: A Modular Mechanistic Framework

Published

December 15, 2020

Author(s)

Clara M. Eichler, Ying Xu, Jianping Cao, Charles J. Weschler, Tunga Salthammer, Glenn C. Morrison, Yinping Zhang, Corinne Mandin, Wenjuan Wei, Patrice Blondeau, Dustin Poppendieck, Elaine A. Cohen Hubal, Xiaoyu Liu, Christiaan Delmaar, Antti J. Koivisto, Oliver Jolliet, Hyeong-Moo Shin, Miriam L. Diamond, Chenyang Bi, John C. Little

Abstract

This paper describes a modular mechanistic framework for predicting chemical emission from indoor sources, partitioning among indoor compartments and exposure to humans present in the indoor environment focusing on semi-volatile organic compounds (SVOCs). Important assumptions and their impacts, mechanistically-consistent source emission categories, relevant environmental compartments, congruent exposure pathways and their respective modeling approaches are summarized based on the current consensus regarding what is known about SVOC behavior indoors. Sources of uncertainty and limitations of the framework are discussed, emphasizing the need for further research in different areas of the field. The modular structure of the framework aims at subsequent inclusion of new research findings, other chemical classes of indoor pollutants and additional mechanistic processes relevant to human exposure indoors. The framework connects the current state of knowledge of SVOC exposure in indoor environments to advance chemical risk assessment, and as such may serve as the foundation of the development of a large, open-source community model to better understand interdependencies with existing and ongoing research and policies.

Citation

Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology

Volume

55

Issue

1

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.0c02329

Local Download

Citation

Eichler, C. , Xu, Y. , Cao, J. , Weschler, C. , Salthammer, T. , Morrison, G. , Zhang, Y. , Mandin, C. , Wei, W. , Blondeau, P. , Poppendieck, D. , Cohen Hubal, E. , Liu, X. , Delmaar, C. , Koivisto, A. , Jolliet, O. , Shin, H. , Diamond, M. , Bi, C. and Little, J. (2020), Assessing Human Exposure to Chemicals in Materials, Products and Articles: A Modular Mechanistic Framework, Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, [online], https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.0c02329, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=929160 (Accessed October 10, 2025)