Division of Environmental Health
Professor and MPH Program Graduate Advisor
Associate Director For Student Affairs
Phone: (619) 594-1688
Office: HT 104
Email: jquintan@sdsu.edu
Download CV (pdf)
Education
- PhD, Environmental Health Sciences, University of California, Berkeley
- MPH, Occupational and Environmental Health, San Diego State University
- BS, Genetics, University of California, Davis
Scholarly Areas
- US-Mexico Border Environmental Justice issues, especially Traffic-related Air Pollution
- Exposure Assessment for Susceptible Populations, such as Children, Especially Through House Dust and Surfaces and Thirdhand Smoke
- Biological Monitoring of Human Populations for Measurement of Exposure, Genetic Damage or Genetic Susceptibility,
Biography
Dr. Penelope J.E. Quintana is a Professor in the division of Environmental Health at the School of Public Health at San Diego State University. She has a research focus on exposures to children and vulnerable populations at the US-Mexico border. She is a Co-Principal Investigator for the Healthy Water, Healthy Air Study investigating pollution from the Tijuana River in relation to nearby community health concerns. She is the Research Project Leader for the SDSU HealthLINK Center project studying indoor exposures to children living near the polluted Tijuana River and community-appropriate interventions to protect health. In conjunction with researchers at Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Tijuana, she has studied exposure to toxic traffic pollutants inside vehicles and to pedestrians waiting long hours to cross the US-Mexico border. She supports US-Mexico border community efforts to monitor their air through deployment of low-cost air sensors in the San Ysidro Air Monitoring Network. She is the author of a seminal report drawing attention to the long northbound wait times and lines of idling vehicles at US-Mexico Ports of Entry as an environmental justice issue for border crossers and surrounding communities. She has assessed children’s exposure to toxicants in house dust and on surfaces, especially residual tobacco toxicants remaining after smoking has taken place, known as thirdhand smoke. She is the PI of an ongoing study to assess whether silicone wristbands worn by children can accurately detect tobacco and cannabis smoke exposure. A member of the California Thirdhand Smoke Research Consortium, she also serves as a lead researcher with the Thirdhand Smoke Resource Center and the Center for Tobacco and the Environment . She serves as a Scientific Guidance Panel member for the California Environmental Contaminant Biomonitoring Program.
Publications
- For an up to date publications list see Google Scholar.
