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Edward Anthony Nardell, MD

Professor in the Department of Environmental Health; Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine

Dr. Edward A. Nardell is a physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH). He is also an associate professor in the Departments of Medicine, Environmental Health and Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard Medical School.

He received his medical degree from Drexel University College of Medicine. He then completed a residency at Hahnemann University Hospital, followed by fellowships in pulmonary disease at Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Medical Center (formerly Boston University Medical Center). He is board certified in internal medicine and pulmonary disease.

The author of over 110 peer-reviewed publications, Dr. Nardell is a prominent researcher of multidrug resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), with a particular focus on airborne TB transmission and control. He is currently studying the transmission of MDR-TB and the effectiveness of various control interventions in several research projects funded by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. He is also involved in a 5-year Fogarty Innovation Grant that uses new technological approaches to airborne infection control to train architects, engineers and physicians in air disinfection research in Peru, South Africa, and other high-burden countries. He is actively developing more efficient and inexpensive ultraviolet germicidal irradiation fixtures and a new environmentally-safe chemical vapor that may reduce airborne transmission. 

Dr. Nardell has served as president of both the Massachusetts Thoracic Society and the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (IUATLD), North American Region. He is also the incoming chair of the IUATLD Tuberculosis Section, Paris, and the recipient of the Chadwick Medal of the Massachusetts Thoracic Society.

Affliations

Department of Environmental Health, Harvard School of Public Health Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard School of Public Health Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital

Dr. Nardell is a professor in the Departments of Medicine and of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and an associate professor in the Departments of Immunology and Infectious Diseases and of Environmental Health at the Harvard School of Public Health. He is an associate in medicine in the Department of Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), in both the Division of Global Health Equity and the Pulmonary Division. His research interests involve the control of tuberculosis under resource-limited conditions, with a focus on the pathogenesis of drug-resistant tuberculosis, its airborne transmission, and transmission control in institutions. He is recently tested interventions to prevent transmission of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) in a unique experimental facility in South Africa, in which large numbers of sentinel guinea pigs served to sample the air from a six-bed MDR-TB ward, part of an MDR-TB referral center. An early observation of this research led to new investigation on TB pathogenesis, specifically the possibility of transient TB infection in guinea pigs as well as humans. Another important finding is that effective treatment rapidly (within days) stops TB transmission, even due to MDR-TB. Further planned research will determine which drugs are responsible for this dramatic effect. Ongoing experiments are also studying the impact of inhaled TB drugs on TB transmission. Another long-standing research avenue is the application of germicidal irradiation to reduce airborne transmission. Dr. Nardell also is developing more efficient, less expensive UVGI fixtures for resource-limited settings. In addition, he has worked on developing and validating a computer-assisted design software package to facilitate planning of UV installations in buildings. He has also begun testing a novel, environmentally safe chemical vapor that may be effective in reducing airborne transmission.

Assessment of SARS-CoV-2 surrogate inactivation on surfaces and in air using UV and blue light-based intervention technologies.
Authors: Authors: Singh D, Soorneedi AR, Vaze N, Domitrovic R, Sharp F, Lindsey D, Rohr A, Moore MD, Koutrakis P, Nardell E, Demokritou P.
J Air Waste Manag Assoc
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Predicting Airborne Infection Risk: Association Between Personal Ambient Carbon Dioxide Level Monitoring and Incidence of Tuberculosis Infection in South African Health Workers.
Authors: Authors: Nathavitharana RR, Mishra H, Sullivan A, Hurwitz S, Lederer P, Meintjes J, Nardell E, Theron G.
Clin Infect Dis
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Ceiling impact on air disinfection performance of Upper-Room Germicidal Ultraviolet (UR-GUV).
Authors: Authors: Zhu S, Lin T, Wang L, Nardell EA, Vincent RL, Srebric J.
Build Environ
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FAST tuberculosis transmission control strategy speeds the start of tuberculosis treatment at a general hospital in Lima, Peru.
Authors: Authors: Tierney DB, Orvis E, Nathavitharana RR, Hurwitz S, Tintaya K, Vargas D, Segura P, de la Gala S, Lecca L, Mitnick CD, Nardell EA.
Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol
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Air Disinfection with Germicidal Ultraviolet: For this Pandemic and the Next.
Authors: Authors: Bergman R, Brenner D, Buonanno M, Eadie E, Forbes PD, Jensen P, Nardell EA, Sliney D, Vincent R, Welch D, Wood K.
Photochem Photobiol
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Air Disinfection for Airborne Infection Control with a Focus on COVID-19: Why Germicidal UV is Essential†.
Authors: Authors: Nardell EA.
Photochem Photobiol
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"If I've got latent TB, I would like to get rid of it": Derivation of the CARD (Constraints, Actions, Risks, and Desires) Framework informed by South African healthcare worker perspectives on latent tuberculosis treatment.
Authors: Authors: Nathavitharana RR, van der Westhuizen A, van der Westhuizen HM, Mishra H, Sampson A, Meintjes J, Nardell E, McDowell A, Theron G.
PLoS One
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Time to revise our tuberculosis infection-latency-disease model in high-burden settings.
Authors: Authors: Nardell EA.
Clin Infect Dis
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Airborne Spread of SARS-CoV-2 and a Potential Role for Air Disinfection.
Authors: Authors: Nardell EA, Nathavitharana RR.
JAMA
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Innovation and Knowledge Sharing Can Transform COVID-19 Infection Prevention Response.
Authors: Authors: Nathavitharana RR, Patel PK, Tierney DB, Mehrotra P, Lederer PA, Davis S, Nardell E.
J Hosp Med
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