# Profiling the Post-accident Exposome in East Palestine

> **NIH NIH R21** · UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH · 2024 · $241,159

## Abstract

Project Summary
 On February 3rd, 2023, a train carrying several chemicals derailed near East Palestine, Ohio, leading
to a fast-moving contamination event that spread released chemicals and their combustion by-products
through the surrounding region. The impacted communities include the immediate evacuation areas in a one-
mile by two-mile area surrounding East Palestine, the other communities in Columbiana and Beaver Counties,
and potentially some downstream communities along the Ohio River. Thus, there is an urgent need to mobilize
environmental monitoring for capturing the extent of contamination in soil, water, and sediment which serve as
the accumulative sinks of the contaminants, as well as document the likely severe and ongoing impacts on the
local environment of these regions and its highly interconnected waterways. Overall, this project aims to
determine the post-accident exposome profiles in the impacted communities surrounding East Palestine due to
the released or generated contaminants caused by this human-made disaster. The overall objective of this
proposal is to determine the post-accident chemical exposome profiles in the impacted communities by both
targeted and non-targeted approaches, thus further conducting fate and transportation, environmental
exposures, and human health risk assessment modeling. Specifically, the following two aims will be performed
to determine the exposome profiles and evaluate the health risks of the chemicals in these exposome profiles.
Aim 1 involves collecting 75 evenly distributed soil, water, and sediment samples in the impacted communities
and conducting rigorous targeted and non-targeted analyses on persistent combustion byproducts including
dioxins, furans, chlorinated furans, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, chlorinated polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons, and polychlorinated biphenyls. Aim 2 involves performing a model-based comprehensive
evaluation of the long-term environmental fate, human exposure levels, and corresponding health risks of all
the quantified contaminants in the exposome profile. A comprehensive model named ”PROduction-To-
Exposure“ will be used to evaluate the accidental release magnitudes of chemicals or generated byproducts
during this derailment accident. This will be a time-sensitive project since the sampling of environmental
matrices needs to begin as soon as possible by performing both immediate analysis and sample banking to
create a record of evolving regional contamination. This project will provide critically needed data on a broad
suite of contaminants that can currently impact the human health surrounding East Palestine as well as
Columbiana and Beaver Counties. Disseminating the results as soon as possible can benefit the communities,
municipalities, and regulators to ensure that key stakeholders are empowered to make informed decisions
about exposure interventions and remediation.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10819726
- **Project number:** 1R21ES036033-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH
- **Principal Investigator:** JAMES P FABISIAK
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $241,159
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-01-22 → 2025-12-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10819726

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10819726, Profiling the Post-accident Exposome in East Palestine (1R21ES036033-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-26 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10819726. Licensed CC0.

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