Dear Colleagues,

I am pleased to announce a Special Issue on the health effects of particulate matter on vulnerable populations. Particulate air pollution is a well-known risk factor for human health, causing more than 3.7 million deaths per year worldwide. Although numerous studies have been conducted on this issue in recent decades, many gaps exist regarding susceptibility, vulnerability, and modifying factors. More investigation is needed to further understand the role of particulate air pollution in causing detrimental effects to health in vulnerable populations including children, pregnant women, older adults, racial and ethnic minorities, the economically disadvantaged, and those with chronic health conditions, including severe mental illness. Understanding the vulnerable populations can improve the scientific basis to assess health risk and provide evidence related to credible pathological mechanisms.

The risk or severity of health outcomes linked to air pollutants is not uniform within populations. There is a substantial divergence between the socioeconomic status of vulnerable people and the level of particulate air pollutants, with the stronger effect of air pollution among people in with low socioeconomic status. Individuals and groups with different socioeconomic status are exposed to air pollution at different levels and are likely to suffer from different health effects.

In this Special Issue, original research articles, narrative and systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and short communications are welcome. Research areas may include, but are not limited to, the following: exposure assessment in vulnerable populations, adverse health effects associated with particulate air pollution, population vulnerability to the health effects of air pollutants, interaction effects of meteorological factors or gaseous and particulate pollutants on health outcomes, and disparities in the impact of air pollution.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Hwan-Cheol Kim
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Atmosphere is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• particulate air pollution
• exposure modeling
• modifying factors
• vulnerable groups
• environmental epidemiology
• inequality
• children
• elder
• pregnant women
• minorities
• deprived people
• socioeconomic status