NIH To Award $8M For New USC Superfund Center To Research And Address 'Forever Chemicals'

Experts in population health, engineering, and medicine will study and address harms related to the manmade pollutants at the new Southern California Superfund Research and Training Program for PFAS Assessment, Remediation and Prevention (ShARP) Center.

A team of scientists from Keck School of Medicine of USC and USC Viterbi School of Engineering has been awarded an $8M, five-year grant from one of the National Institutes of Health to launch a Superfund Research Program Center where they will study environmental contamination from “forever chemicals,” or PFAS, which are used to make multiple household items from cookware to furniture.

With the grant from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the USC scientists are establishing the Southern California Superfund Research and Training Program for PFAS Assessment, Remediation and Prevention, or ShARP Center. There, they will investigate how these chemicals impact liver health, and how to detect and remove them from public water sources.

Known as “forever chemicals” because they take so long to break down, PFAS are estimated to be present in the blood of more than 99% of U.S. adults. Researchers from the Keck School of Medicine have found that these chemicals can affect nearly every organ in the body, including the kidneys and liver, and are linked to a range of rare cancers. Still, much work remains to better understand how PFAS affect health.

“We still have an incomplete understanding of the health impacts of PFAS exposure, including their impact on human liver disease,” said Vaia Lida Chatzi, MD, PhD, a professor of population and public health sciences at the Keck School of Medicine and director of the ShARP Center. “That’s one of the many unknowns our center will work to answer.”

The new center builds on a strong foundation of PFAS research and remediation efforts by Chatzi and her team. In addition to studying how the pollutants affect health, the researchers have documented PFAS contamination of drinking water, as well as food and beverage products, and partnered with local communities to share information on how to stay safe.

The team’s recent research efforts were supported by a 2023 USC President’s Sustainability Initiative Award, which paved the way for the launch of the ShARP Center, Chatzi said. The pilot grant allowed researchers to gather and publish data on PFAS in Southern California and to show that a cross-disciplinary collaboration could lead to solutions.

“At USC, we are united in our mission to build a healthier, more sustainable and prosperous future for all,” said USC President Carol Folt. “The ShARP Center is an important step in tackling the growing problem of chemical contamination. This interdisciplinary effort will not only advance research on forever chemicals, but also reflects our decades-long commitment to finding real-world solutions to environmental health challenges.”

Working together on PFAS
Superfund Research Program Centers unite leaders from various fields to protect public health from hazardous substances, including those found at Superfund sites deemed as a threat to human health by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. With the research grant and the establishment of the ShARP Center, USC is among nearly two dozen universities that lead Superfund research in the country, according to information maintained by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

Scientists at the ShARP Center will focus on understanding how PFAS affect liver health, building on early evidence from animal models. To explore how PFAS exposure affects human liver cells, Chatzi and her team will employ advanced techniques such as 3D spheroid modeling. These lab-grown clusters of cells help scientists more accurately simulate what happens in the human body, compared to traditional 2D cell cultures.

They will also conduct a population study that examines the link between PFAS exposure and liver disease in youth, a group that faces an outsized and growing risk of the condition. Currently, there are no effective intervention strategies to tackle the liver disease epidemic affecting children and adolescents across the country. The center researchers will investigate what factors and mechanisms may be driving the spike in liver disease and identify critical approaches to address this gap.

One major problem is PFAS contamination of public drinking water, which affects an estimated 200 million people nationwide. Researchers from the USC Viterbi School of Engineering will explore ways to remove PFAS from polluted water, including through the use of special microbes, chemicals or heating methods that can break down the chemicals.

“This collaboration includes experts in biological processes, water reuse, chemical transport and more. That diverse knowledge will be critical for solving challenges related to PFAS and public and environmental health,” said Adam Smith, PhD, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at the Viterbi School of Engineering and one of the ShARP Center’s leaders.

From research to action
While research is ongoing, Chatzi and her team are already taking steps to protect public health. They have launched several efforts that aim to educate high-risk Southern California communities about the harms of PFAS exposure.

“We’ve been building partnerships with community leaders to collaborate on exposure assessment of PFAS and health studies across L.A.,” said Max Aung, PhD, MPH, an assistant professor of population and public health sciences at the Keck School of Medicine, who will oversee engagement efforts at the ShARP Center. “Our engagement core will continue working with community leaders to share research findings and gain insights that can help us build effective solutions and interventions.”

The ShARP Center will also share findings with industry partners, policymakers, and the broader scientific community, with the goal of using its remediation work as a model for similar initiatives nationwide.

About the ShARP Center
In addition to Chatzi, Smith and Aung, the center’s other leaders from Keck School of Medicine of USC are Rob McConnell, David Conti, Jesse Goodrich and Jane Steinberg at the Department of Population and Public Health Sciences; and Ana Maretti-Garcia and Lucy Golden from the Department of Medicine. The center’s leading researchers from USC Viterbi include Dan McCurry and Amy Childress. The University of California, Irvine researchers are Scott Bartell and Veronica Vieira.

This work is supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences [P42ES36506].