Transforming human, animal and planetary health through community-centered solutions that prevent environmental exposures and disease, advance nature-based solutions and enable just adaptations to changing climate and health conditions.
Healthy and Resilient Communities
Ohio State advances interdisciplinary approaches that connect environmental quality, public health and community well-being across diverse urban and rural contexts to prevent exposures, strengthen resilience and improve population health outcomes.
This work recognizes that communities experience environmental and health risks differently based on infrastructure, access to care, economic opportunity and ecological conditions. Researchers partner with local governments, health systems, planners and community organizations to co-develop solutions grounded in lived experience and informed by rigorous interdisciplinary research.
Environmental Exposures and Health
Researchers examine how environmental stressors, including extreme heat, air quality, water contamination and infrastructure disruption, interact with chronic disease, social vulnerability and access to care, using integrated data and predictive modeling to identify risk patterns and inform strategies that reduce exposure and improve health outcomes.
Community-Centered Adaptation
Ohio State researchers work with communities to design adaptation strategies that reflect local priorities, build institutional capacity and support equitable responses to environmental change.
Nature-Based and Systems Solutions
Researchers advance nature-based and integrated systems approaches that improve ecosystem health and strengthen community well-being, including green infrastructure, watershed restoration, urban design and cross-sector strategies that connect environmental quality to long-term human and economic health.
Mark Weir, Faculty Research Lead for Healthy & Resilient Communities