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Susan Chemerynski, ScD, MPH, is the Jacob I. and Irene B. Fabrikant Chair in Health, Risk and Society and the Director of the Risk Sciences and Public Policy Institute in the Department of Health Policy and Management. Dr. Chemerynski is a risk scientist and leader dedicated to advancing risk and decision sciences to improve public health, by developing approaches and tools to understand and inform exposure and risk prevention and reduction strategies and to translate science into policy and practice. Her public health education and career have spanned from research to practice, across academia, consulting, and government in the areas of environmental health, risk assessment and management, and tobacco control and regulatory science. In her present roles, she is working to advance risk science, policy, and management for public health practice to address pressing health risk issues in our society and reduce health disparities.
Prior to joining BSPH, Dr. Chemerynski has conducted research and worked to address environmental and occupational health issues concerning air pollution, pesticides and other chemicals, and urban and built environments, particularly considering complex and cumulative risk challenges, vulnerable populations, and aspects of variability and uncertainty. From 2013-2024, Dr. Chemerynski served in roles at the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) Center for Tobacco Products’ Office of Science, including as the Risk and Decision Analysis Branch Chief. Over her time at FDA, she led multiple interdisciplinary groups as well as research programs and provided vision, expertise, and leadership to develop risk and decision science approaches for tobacco regulatory science. She has provided executive level leadership, strategic thinking, and advice to promote impactful change and effective programmatic and organizational growth, collaboration, and management. Dr. Chemerynski previously worked in environmental consulting and as faculty at the universities of Yale, Harvard and Brown. She holds a Doctor of Science degree in Environmental Science and Risk Management from Harvard School of Public Health, where she majored in Toxicology and Risk and Decision Sciences, a Master of Public Health degree in Environmental Health Sciences from Yale University School of Medicine and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Johns Hopkins University in Public Health.
Select Publications
Asgharian, B., Price, O. T., Wasdo, S., Fallica, J., Erives, G., Li, C., Yeager, R., Chemerynski, S., & Schroeter, J. (2024). Fate of inhaled electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) puff constituents in the human respiratory tract. Journal of Aerosol Science, 178, 106363. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaerosci.2024.106363
Yeager, R. P., Kushman, M., Chemerynski, S., Weil, R., Fu, X., White, M., Callahan-Lyon, P., & Rosenfeldt, H. (2016). Proposed Mode of Action for Acrolein Respiratory Toxicity Associated with Inhaled Tobacco Smoke. Toxicological sciences : an official journal of the Society of Toxicology, 151(2), 347–364. https://doi.org/10.1093/toxsci/kfw051
Wason, S. C., Julien, R., Perry, M. J., Smith, T. J., & Levy, J. I. (2013). Modeling exposures to organophosphates and pyrethroids for children living in an urban low-income environment. Environmental research, 124, 13–22. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2012.08.009
Wason, S. C., Smith, T. J., Perry, M. J., & Levy, J. I. (2012). Using physiologically-based pharmacokinetic models to incorporate chemical and non-chemical stressors into cumulative risk assessment: a case study of pesticide exposures. International journal of environmental research and public health, 9(5), 1971–1983. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph9051971
Levy, J. I., Chemerynski, S. M., & Tuchmann, J. L. (2006). Incorporating concepts of inequality and inequity into health benefits analysis. International journal for equity in health, 5, 2. https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-5-2