Élyse Caron-Beaudoin, PhD
Assistant Professor, Environmental Health
University of Toronto Scarborough
FROM BENCH TO COMMUNITIES
The mission of our lab is to develop projects in partnership with communities living in a changing environment to assess the impacts of anthropogenic pressures on health and well-being. To investigate these associations, we are using an ecosystem approach combining information from multiple levels of biological organization. Anthropogenic pressures lead to rapid and significant changes in the environment, posing a threat to public health especially for vulnerable populations. Several studies confirm that some communities are disproportionately affected by environmental changes. Many of these communities have expressed concerns about the potential health effects of changes in their environment, but few have received support and guidance from researchers in implementing research projects based on their concerns.
Our lab highlights community knowledge as a valuable source of information in order to explore the relationships between environmental factors and health. We use an innovative participatory approach combining toxicology, molecular biology, community-based research, exposure assessment, epidemiology and environmental health.
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Community-based research, EcoHealth, toxicology, molecular biology, environmental health, public health, Indigenous health, extractive industries, hydraulic fracturing, emerging contaminants, industrial contaminants, pesticides, environmental justice, environmental racism
RESEARCH INTERESTS
We wish to acknowledge this land on which the University of Toronto and the From bench to communities lab operate. For thousands of years it has been the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the Seneca, and most recently, the Mississaugas of the Credit River. Today, this meeting place is still the home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work, live and play on this land.