Confirmed Speakers

  • Founder and Program Director of Clean Air Accelerator, the world’s first startup accelerator focused on clean air technologies to prevent spread of COVID-19 and other airborne diseases

  • Aaron Collins is a mechanical engineer with a background in aerosol science, who has been testing and evaluating masks, and sharing his findings on Youtube and ever growing Google Doc. This work resulted in a variety of media appearances including NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Scientific American, CBS Mornings, Good Morning America, CNN and BBC Radio. Aaron is also a passionate advocate for clean indoor air, having helped form OpenAeros, an open source hardware company focused around meteorology in the clean air space, as well as The OSLUV Project, a 501c3 non-profit tackling mitigation and solutions to equitably bringing clean air to those most impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • Prof. Lidia Morawska is a Distinguished Professor and Australian Laureate Fellow in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia; the Director of the International Laboratory for Air Quality and Health (ILAQH) at QUT, a World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre on Air Quality and Health; a Co-Director in Australia for the Australia – China Centre for Air Quality Science and Management (ACC-AQSM); an Adjunct Professor at the Institute for Environmental and Climate Research (ECI), at the Jinan University, Guangzhou, China; and a Vice-Chancellor Fellow, Global Centre for Clean Air Research (GCARE), University of Surrey, United Kingdom. She conducts fundamental and applied research in the interdisciplinary field of air quality and its impact on human health and the environment, with a specific focus on science of airborne particulate matter. She is an author of >1,000 journal papers, book chapters and conference papers. Lidia has been involved at the executive level with a number of relevant national/international professional bodies, is a member of the Australian Academy of Science, Queensland Academy of Arts and Sciences, Royal Society of Biology and acting as an advisor to the World Health Organization.

    Lidia Morawska grew up in a city in the south-eastern part of Poland – Przemyśl. This is where she completed her primary and secondary education during her university years. She is a physicist and received her doctorate in 1982 at the Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland for research on radon and its progeny. From 1982 to 1987, she was a research fellow at the Institute of Physics and Nuclear Techniques, Academy of Mining and Metallurgy, Cracow, Poland. She spent from 1987 to 1991 in Canada, conducting research first at McMaster University in Hamilton, as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and later at the University of Toronto. In 1991, she was appointed Senior Lecturer at QUT, as well as promoted to Professor in 2003. In 1992, she established the Environmental Aerosol Laboratory at QUT, renamed the ILAQH in 2002, when it became a WHO Collaborating Centre for Air Quality and Health. She is a long-standing collaborator and advisor to the WHO and has contributed to all WHO air quality-related guidelines since 1990, including co-chairing the Guideline Development Group (2006 to 2021), responsible for numerous standards. She is Associate Editor of Science of the Total Environment journal from 2010-2020.

  • Prof. Yaneer Bar-Yam received his SB and PhD in physics from MIT in 1978 and 1984 respectively. Since the late 1980s he has contributed to founding the field of complex systems science, introducing fundamental mathematical rigor, real world application, and educational programs for new concepts and insights of this field. In developing new mathematical methods and in their application he has published on a wide range of scientific and real world problems ranging from cell biology to the global financial crisis.

    He has advised the Chairman’s Action Group at the Pentagon about global social unrest and the crises in Egypt and Syria, the National Security Council and the National Counter Terrorism Council on global strategy, the Chief of Naval Operations Strategic Studies Group about military force transformation, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about delivery of prevention services and control of hospital infections, Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Congressman Barney Frank about market regulation and the financial crisis, and other government organizations, NGOs, and corporations on using principles and insights from complex systems science.

    His development of multiscale representations as a generalization of renormalization group addressed the limitations of calculus and statistics in the study of nonlinear and network system dependencies in collective behaviors. His recent work quantitatively analyzes the origins and impacts of market crashes, social unrest, ethnic violence, military conflict and pandemics, the structure and dynamics of social networks, as well as the bases of creativity, panic, evolution and altruism. He is the author of over 200 research papers in professional journals, including Science, Nature, PNAS, American Naturalist, and Physical Review Letters, has 3 patents, and has given 175 invited presentations. His work on the causes of the global food crisis was cited among the top 10 scientific discoveries of 2011 by Wired magazine.

    He is the author of two books: a textbook Dynamics of Complex Systems, and Making Things Work, which applies complex systems science to solving problems in healthcare, education, systems engineering, international development, and ethnic conflict. He has taught the concepts and methods of complex systems science to over 2,000 graduate students, professionals and executives. He has been a Visiting Scholar at Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard and the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. He is currently Research Scientist at the MIT Media Laboratory.

    He chaired the International Conference on Complex Systems (ICCS) and is the managing editor of a Springer book series on complexity. His work has been described in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Sunday Times, Die Zeit, Le Monde, Time, The Atlantic Monthly, Scientific American, Wired, Fast Company, Forbes, Slate, Mother Jones, and Vice, among others. He has appeared on ABC News, Canada’s CTV, RT, BBC Radio, NPR Radio, and other national media outlets. His scientific visualizations received recognition as “best of” from Wired in 2011 and 2013, and from Motherboard in 2013.

  • Anne Miller is a strategist with deep experience in health care. Over 20 years, she has facilitated the development of novel medical devices, surgical products, diagnostic tools, and innovations for an array of companies.

  • Andrew Hewat, a practicing sonographer, has been active within the trade union movement for more than two decades and has represented VAHPA on the Health Services Union National Council, as well as on the Geelong Trades Hall Council.

    Andrew is a sonographer at Barwon Health with more than 30 years professional experience spanning the public and private sectors, and rural and metropolitan centres across Australia.

    Andrew has been a member of the Union for over 25 years, a delegate for twelve years and has served on the HSU National Council for more than five years.

    As a passionate unionist he has also served on the Executive of Geelong Trades Hall Council for more than five years.

    Through his involvement in working parties, advisory groups and consultations, Andrew has an in-depth understanding of the workforce, standards, funding and policy issues affecting Victorian Allied Health Professionals.

  • Joshua Agar is an assistant professor at the Institute of Civil Engineering at University of the Philippines Diliman. He is also a research fellow for the UP Building Research Service and the UP Center for Air Research in Urban Environments.

  • Dr Pieter Peach currently maintains Clean Air Stars, a website developed to help businesses understand how to assess their indoor aerosol transmission risk, find professional guidance where time and resources allow, get advice and testimonials, and build a directory of businesses with safer air.

    Dr. Peach is an anaesthesiologist who sees cleaner indoor air as one of the sustainable, minimally disruptive interventions that can be cost-effectively implemented to reduce the impact of future waves of SARS-CoV-2 to help reduce the need for future restrictions.

    He started out his career as a microbiologist/virologist, and after medical school undertook postgraduate training in public health and epidemiology before training in anaesthesiology.

    He believes businesses can make sustainable changes to their indoor spaces to reduce the amount of shared air that transmits respiratory viruses like SARS-CoV-2 to help us get through not only this pandemic, but also the next.

  • Jonisha Pollard is the Branch Chief of the Research Branch at the National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL). As Branch Chief, she ensures NPPTL maintains a responsive research portfolio that supports the needs for research and guidance to improve the design, performance, and usability of personal protective equipment and technologies.

  • Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding is an epidemiologist and health economist, Chief of COVID Task Force at the New England Complex Systems Institute, co-founder of the World Health Network, and the Chief Health Economist for Microclinic International. He is also on the COVID-19 mortality expert committee for the World Health Organization.

    He was formerly a faculty member and researcher at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Chan School of Public Health between 2004-2020, Senior Fellow at the Federation of American Scientist, and an epidemiologist at the Brigham and Women's Hospital.

    In January 2020, he was recognized in the media as one of the first to alert the public on the pandemic risk of COVID-19. With the support of his World Health Network task force, he focuses his efforts on analyzing COVID-19 trends, stopping COVID-19 misinformation, and improving health policy.

    Dr. Feigl-Ding’s work focuses on the intersection of public health, public policy, and randomized trials for improving health systems. He also currently works on social-network based behavioral interventions for prevention, drug safety, diabetes/obesity prevention, and public health programs in the US and globally. He has further expertise in designing and conducting randomized trials, systematic reviews, public health programs, and improving health policy.

    He was noted in his role as a whistleblower and leader of a key two-year-long investigation into the controversial drug safety and risk data of Vioxx®, Celebrex®, and Bextra® that drew FDA and national attention. Highlighted and express-published in JAMA, as corresponding joint-first author, he was also recognized for his role in the New York Times, and in the book Poison Pills: The Untold Story of the Vioxx Drug Scandal.

    A childhood survivor and cancer prevention advocate, he was called one of the ‘Facebook philanthropists‘, founding the 6 million member online Campaign for Cancer Prevention, featured in Newsweek magazine in 2007. In total online reach, he previously directed disease prevention advocacy platforms with over 10 million members on Facebook Causes. He led the first ever direct-to-science online crowdfunding initiative, fundraising over $500,000 (median public donation $15) for medical research, led a partnership with Brigham and Women's Hospital, and featured in the New York Times in 2009.

    In the aftermath of the Flint Water Crisis, he founded the first geo-social network and public alert system for drinking water toxic contamination, as featured in WIRED. He established the Toxin Alert Drinking Water Database with 500,000-locations nationwide for informing the public about water hazards in communities. For his work, he was awarded the 2017 Mark V. Anderson Leadership Award from Sigma Chi Foundation.

    Previously, during the 2014 Ebola pandemic, he led a team to co-develop one of the first mobile contact-tracing applications for infectious disease outbreaks. The project was shelved after lack of interest in pandemic prepardness technology. His early contact-tracing app's contributions lived on to inform the later designs of contact tracing apps developed during the COVID-19 outbreak.

    He has published in leading journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, The Lancet, and more. His 150+ publications have received 114,000 citations (H-Index 84). As a Web of Science Highly Cited Researcher, he was ranked in 2018 as among the Top 1% of all scientists worldwide, and named among the 186 top cited scholars across Harvard University.

    Altogether, his competitively awarded projects as PI/Director have received over $10 million in funding. A World Economic Forum Global Shaper, he has chaired committees for the Health Directorate of the European Commission, advised the World Health Organization, Denmark Ministry of Health, and served as a member of the Global Burden of Disease Project. He also advised and successfully convinced the C-suite leaders of a major Fortune 100 food/beverage company to adopt the WHO health recommendations for added sugars. He has also advised many governors, state legislators, members of Congress, and other world leaders.

    Dr. Feigl-Ding graduated from The Johns Hopkins University with Honors in Public Health and Phi Beta Kappa. He then completed his dual doctorate in epidemiology and his doctorate in nutrition, separately, as the youngest graduate to complete his double doctoral programs at age 23 from Harvard SPH. Next, concurrently with his postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard, he studied medicine at Boston University School of Medicine for several years, until he left BUSM to become faculty at Harvard Medical School. Teaching at Harvard for over 15 years, he has advised and mentored two dozen students and lectured in more than a dozen graduate and undergraduate courses, for which he received the Derek Bok Distinction in Teaching Award from Harvard College.

  • The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s (CDPHE) Clean Air for Schools program provided free high-efficiency particulate air filter portable air cleaners (HEPA PACs) and associated supplies to K-12 schools and licensed early childhood education (ECE) providers.

    The program’s goal is to improve schools’ indoor air quality as a mitigation measure for exposure to respiratory viruses such as COVID-19, flu, and RSV, as well as other pollutants and pathogens that contribute to asthma, allergies, and other chronic respiratory illnesses.

  • William P. Bahnfleth, Ph.D., P.E., Fellow/Presidential Member ASHRAE, is a professor in the Department of Architectural Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University—University Park, PA. He holds a doctorate in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois and is a registered professional engineer. He is a Fellow of ASHRAE, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the International Society for Indoor Air Quality and Climate. Dr. Bahnfleth is the author or co-author of more than 170 journal articles and 14 books/book chapters. He has served ASHRAE in a variety of capacities, including Student Branch Advisor, Chapter Governor, Technical Committee and Standing Committee Chair, Director-at-Large, Vice President, Treasurer, and 2013-14 Society President. He is the chair of the ASHRAE Epidemic Task Force. His ASHRAE awards include the Exceptional Service Award, the Louise and Bill Holladay Distinguished Fellow Award, the E.K. Campbell Award of Merit for teaching, and the F. Paul Anderson Award, ASHRAE’s highest individual award.

  • Ewan graduated with first class honours from the University of Strathclyde in 2005 with Masters in Physics and Mathematical Finance. Following this he embarked on a PhD with Professor Harry Moseley at the Photobiology Department in Ninewells Hospital in Dundee. During his PhD he worked closely with the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) and published several papers including his work on the effect of exposure of photosensitive individuals to energy saving lamps and the optical radiation hazard from intense pulsed light (IPL) systems.

    Having completed his PhD by the summer of 2009 he accepted a position in the Nuclear Medicine Department at Ninewells Hospital as a Route 2 Pre-registration Clinical Scientist. Whilst in the Nuclear Medicine Department he was involved in editing and co-authoring IPEM Report 111 Quality Control of Gamma Cameras and Nuclear Medicine Computer Systems.

    Ewan completed his registration as a Clinical Scientist in October 2013 and moved back to the Photobiology Unit in August 2015, taking up the position of Head of Scientific Services for Photobiology and Optical Radiation.

  • Nicholas Burt is CEO of the Facility Management Association of Australia (FMA). He has over 20 years’ leadership experience, including appointments at the senior executive level within the community services and facility management sectors for both NGOs and local government. His roles have covered the entire spectrum of policy development and planning, program implementation and management. During his time with the FMA, Nic’s commitment to improving process has helped to drive industry development and deliver high-quality services to stakeholders in the facilities management sector. Nic also chairs the Standards Australia technical committee MB-022, Facilities Management, and was involved in the development of the new ISO standards for facilities management.

  • As an educator, researcher, and writer with over 25 years of experience, I have deep expertise in making scientific information about workplace exposures accessible to a wide range of audiences. As a consultant, I frequently help companies, unions, organizations, and CEOs make well-informed and scientifically-sound decisions for protecting workers from hazardous airborne contaminants — like SARS-COV2, Ebola, asbestos and wood dust. I identify solutions to workplace hazards by using systematic approaches that rely on scientific research and core health and safety principles. I am a frequent guest speaker, spokesperson, and advocate for a scientific approach to health and safety.

  • Katherine leads districtwide initiatives to transform the sustainability measures and environmental health of 132 BPS buildings. Serving on the Facilities Management leadership team, she manages the Sustainability, EH&S, and Utilities Divisions. Katherine joined Boston Public Schools in 2017, following a sustainability career at the University of California, Berkeley. She holds a BA in Political Science with a Minor in Environmental Studies from Boston College. Today she will be speaking on "The Future of Indoor Air Quality Sensors in Classrooms

  • Barry has facilitated the implementation of innovation in healthcare over the years by being a leader in the development of national standards in Canada at Canadian Standards Association (CSA) as well as global standards at the International Standards Organization (ISO).

    Barry also provides leadership in the Canadian Healthcare Engineering Society (CHES), Infection Prevention and Control Canada (IPAC), the International Ultraviolet Association (IUVA), Coalition for Healthcare Acquired Infection Reduction (CHAIR), and most recently the Canadian Association of PPE Manufacturers (CAPPEM).

  • Jim Rosenthal is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Air Relief Technologies, Inc. which is the parent company of Tex-Air Filters, Allergy Clean Environments and Allergy, Air & More. He has over 19 years of experience in the air filtration and environmental control industries and has been active in the National Air Filtration Association (NAFA) – serving as its President in 2009-2010. He is a Certified Air Filter Specialist (CAFS) by NAFA. He is also Past President of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America – Texas Chapter.

    Jim has given over 50 presentations and training seminars on air filtration and indoor air quality. He has presented for the Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA), RSES, the National Air Duct Cleaning Association (NADCA), NAFA, the International Filtration and Separations Society and numerous colleges, junior colleges and trade schools.

    He is also a frequent contributor of articles on air filtration, indoor air chemistry and indoor air quality to national trade journals and technical journals. His articles have appeared in Indoor Environment Connections, Air Media, RSES Journal and the Journal of Indoor Air.

  • Stephane Bilodeau is an engineer with a Ph.D. in Thermodynamics and Fluids and a Master's in Applied Sciences. He is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Bioengineering at McGill University, an Independent International Contractor for the United Nations Office of Project Services, and a Cleantech (Smart Phases) Chief Technology Officer. Both an academic and an entrepreneur in clean technologies for more than 25 years, he is the Chair of the Public Affairs Advisory Committee Engineers Canada, Chair of the Covid Action Group, and Coordinator of the Indoor Air Quality Task Force at the World Health Network. He contributes actively to the Canadian Aerosol Transmission Coalition.

    Website

    https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephane-bilodeau/

    https://www.aerosoltransmissioncoalition.ca/

    https://smbilodeau.medium.com/

    https://twitter.com/smbilodeau

  • Jose-Luis Jimenez is a Professor of Chemistry and a Fellow of CIRES at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He is a Highly Cited Researcher, and a Fellow of the AAAR and the AGU. He has been investigating airborne transmission for the last 3 years, for example demonstrating that superspreading events are due to airborne transmission, and tracing the historical roots for the denial of transmission through the air.

  • Joey Fox is professional engineer with more than 10 years in the HVAC industry. Throughout the COVID pandemic, he’s used my experience to educate people about ventilation, filtration and general air cleaning to protect themselves from COVID.

    https://itsairborne.com/

  • Indoor Air Care Advocates

  • Maryann D’Alessandro, Ph.D., has served as the Director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL) since March 2012. She also served as the Associate Director for Science for NPPTL from 2003-2012. Maryann provides leadership to the NIOSH Personal Protective Technology (PPT) Core and Specialty Program and the Public Safety Program where she serves as the Manager leading the effort to align PPT initiatives with user needs across all workplace industry sectors.

    Within the PPT Program, Maryann has served as the catalyst for aligning surveillance, research, standards, certification, outreach and intervention activities to improve workplace safety and health. She has played a key role in the COVID-19 response including leading personal protective equipment research, respirator conformity assessment, combatting counterfeit and substandard PPE, and addressing respiratory protection needs for the general public.

    Prior to joining NIOSH in 2003, she had a short academic career at the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Bioengineering and served in various U.S. Army research and development organizations for 15 years in both an active duty (12 years) and reserve capacity (3 year). Maryann holds Electrical Engineering degrees from the Florida Institute of Technology (B.S.), Fairleigh Dickinson University (M.S.), and Georgia Institute of Technology (Ph.D.). She also is the recipient of multiple awards including the 2021 James P. Keogh Award for Outstanding Service, the 2021 Federal Executive Board Gold Award for Outstanding Service to the Public, and she led the PPT Program to receive the 2021 CDC Director's Award for Excellence in Public Health Impact (COVID-19 award category).

  • Kathleen works part-time in evidence and knowledge translation as well as medical office administration, turning the family medical clinic into a "clean air clinic" with CO2 monitoring, HEPA air cleaners, a big Corsi-Rosenthal box, required masks and free respirators for staff and patients. In her spare time she is a member of the Canadian Aerosol Transmission Coalition, a national group of people in Canada advocating for clean air in schools, and Protect our Province New Brunswick.