Professor Jonathan Grigg

Job Title:

Professor of Paediatric Respiratory and Environment

Telephone:

020 7882 2206

Email:

j.grigg@qmul.ac.uk

Biography:

Previously at the Department of Child Health, University of Leicester, Professor Grigg's area of research lies in the mechanisms of respiratory disease in children, and new treatments for wheezing disorders in young children. He is particularly interested in the hidden adverse costs of air pollution and how environmental factors, such as particles of carbon from exhaust pipes, impact on lung growth. By measuring, for example, carbon content in the lower airway cells of children aged between 7 and 18 years, Professor Grigg and his team have found that higher levels of carbon equate to lower levels of lung function. He is also investigating the mechanism underlying the increased vulnerability to pneumonia in children exposed to air pollution in the developing world. (Indoor smoke is an additional factor here - over two million children a year die as a result of an increased susceptibility to infection). This represents a new area of research, and is the first phase of a strategy to link an understanding of basic mechanisms to effective exposure reduction in the field. Professor Grigg is also looking at ways in which children might be protected from these effects - for example the development of new stove designs in Guatemala , and biogas stoves in India.

More broadly, Professor Grigg has plans to develop a Centre for Children's Environmental Health at Queen Mary. There are several in the US and Canada but none in the UK . At its core
will be programme of clinical research with the strategic aim of reducing environmental threats to children's health in the UK.