# Occupational Safety and Health Program

> **NIH ALLCDC T03** · PURDUE UNIVERSITY · 2021 · $150,000

## Abstract

Project Summary
The workplace has a substantial influence on workers' overall health and well-being. Moreover, rates of
workplace fatalities and injuries in Indiana are higher than the national average, indicating a particular need in
this region. However, despite the fact that there is an unmet need for professional industrial hygienists,
funding and support for occupational health and safety programs have been declining. Therefore, there is a
clear need for enhanced support of graduate programs in industrial hygiene and occupational health and
safety. Purdue University's graduate program in Occupational and Environmental Health Science (OEHS) is
ideally situated to provide increased training opportunities for the next generation of industrial hygienists. The
mission of Purdue's OEHS graduate program is to prepare its graduates to be professionals, leaders and
researchers in Industrial Hygiene and related fields. This program has maintained ABET accreditation in
industrial hygiene since 1997 and a NIOSH training grant since 1993. Since 2011, our faculty and students
have secured over $3 million in external funding to support occupational and environmental health related
research, published more than 45 peer-reviewed journal articles, and received more than 30 awards for their
excellence in research, scholarship, and service. Graduates of this program have taken leadership roles in
industrial hygiene, occupational health, occupational safety, environmental health, and related fields. Over the
next five years, Purdue's industrial hygiene graduate program will endeavor to maintain its quality and expand
its capacity for graduate student training. Increased activities to recruit and maintain students from diverse
backgrounds will be implemented in the next five years. Our faculty are notable for the diversity and breadth of
their expertise within occupational safety and health specialty areas including industrial hygiene, exposure
assessment, radiation safety and health, occupational epidemiology, and occupational toxicology. Faculty and
students conduct research related to occupational exposure and impacts of manganese and other metals;
characterization and risk assessment of air quality, particularly exposures to nanoparticles; and radiation health
and safety. Required coursework for our graduate programs covers safety and ethics, exposure assessment,
physical agents, industrial hygiene measurements and instrumentation, safety engineering, ergonomics,
ventilation and control technology, toxicology, epidemiology, environmental health, and statistics. The core
curriculum utilize student activities that emphasize critical thinking, communications skills, teamwork, creativity
and awareness of current issues in occupational health. Taken together, the combination of experience and
expertise of its faculty and students ensure that graduates of Purdue's OEHS graduate program will become
tomorrow's leaders in the field of industrial hygiene and occupation...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10246147
- **Project number:** 5T03OH008615-16
- **Recipient organization:** PURDUE UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Ellen M Wells
- **Activity code:** T03 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** ALLCDC
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $150,000
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-07-01 → 2022-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10246147

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10246147, Occupational Safety and Health Program (5T03OH008615-16). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10246147. Licensed CC0.

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