School of Public Health News

Professor Junfeng Zhang, PhD '94, has been appointed associate dean for the Piscataway/New Brunswick Campus and Global Public Health at the UMDNJ-School of Public Health. Dr. Zhang will supervise the operation of the Piscataway/New Brunswick Campus and will lead the School’s initiative on Global Public Health.

Dr. Zhang joined the School of Public Health in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health in 2001. His prior professional appointments include faculty positions at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Rutgers Graduate School – New Brunswick, Imperial College in the UK, and East-West Center in Hawaii. He was awarded a Master of Science degree in atmospheric chemistry from Peking University in 1988, and later was awarded a Master of Science degree in environmental sciences from Rutgers University and a PhD degree in 1994 in the joint UMDNJ and Rutgers Exposure Assessment Program. He has served as acting chair, Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, for the School of Public Health since September 1, 2006.

Dr. Zhang studies a wide range of environmental health issues around the world using both laboratory and field approaches. His research focuses on assessing contaminant exposures and resulting health effects in susceptible populations (e.g., asthmatic patients and children) and in the general public. Environmental hazards that Dr. Zhang has studied include urban air pollution, rural indoor air pollution from burning wood and coal, as well as lead and other toxic metals in household dust and consumer products. He has conducted collaborative research and education in China, Thailand, South Korea, Malaysia, India, Egypt, Guatemala, Denmark, and the United Kingdom.

Beginning in the 1990s, Dr. Zhang measured emissions of greenhouse gases from various cooking and heating stoves as well as charcoal-making kilns in China, India, Thailand, Kenya, and Brazil. The work resulted in more than a dozen peer-reviewed papers underscoring the significant contribution of greenhouse gases from numerous household combustion devices in developing countries. Because of this work, Dr. Zhang was invited by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to serve as a member of its working group addressing greenhouse gas emissions from biomass and coal combustion in developing countries. He also served as a reviewer of the IPCC greenhouse gas emissions inventory. In 2007, Dr. Zhang was recognized as one of the scientists who made significant contributions to the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to IPCC.

Dr. Zhang’s recent studies focus on the development and application of biomarkers that can reflect diesel exhaust exposure and health effects associated with particulate matter. He was the senior author of a recent New England Journal of Medicine original article reporting respiratory effects of exposure to diesel traffic in persons with asthma. He is leading a multi-disciplinary research team to examine molecular and physiologic responses to drastic reductions in air pollution during the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

In fewer than 15 years of his academic life, Dr. Zhang has published nearly 100 peer-reviewed original articles and reviews, serving as the principal author for half of those publications. He has secured over $2.3 million in current grant funding as Principal Investigator. He is also a major contributor for many other collaborative proposals with faculty at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, mainly through his active participation of academic activities of the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute (EOHSI). He serves on a number of university or school wide committees, including the School of Public Health Doctoral Committee and the UMDNJ International Program Task Force. He has served on National Institutes of Health study sections, US Environmental Protection Agency review panels, National Science Foundation site visit teams, the International Agency for Research on Cancer monograph working group, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention review panels.

Dr. Zhang served as mentor for more than 10 doctoral graduates in the UMDNJ-Rutgers Joint Exposure Science Program and School of Public Health PhD Program. He has served on numerous dissertation research committees and advised numerous MPH students. Dr. Zhang is held in very high regards by the administration, faculty, staff, and especially the students at the UMDNJ-School of Public Health.