Soma Barsen, BSc, MPP, MSc

Soma Barsen is a doctoral student in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the Yale School of Public Health. Her PhD research focuses on nano- and microplastics, evaluating exposures and assessing the associated health risks.

Soma earned her undergraduate degree in cell biology and neuroscience from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. She then pursued a Master of Public Policy (MPP) at the School of Public Policy at Simon Fraser University to better understand how science can inform public policy and the need to incorporate multiple perspectives, disciplines, and methods of analysis. As part of her MPP, she focused on driving evidence-based change by using scientific findings as the foundation for policymaking. Soma’s master's thesis was a novel study that she independently developed and designed, exploring household sources of microplastics and strategies for developing effective interventions at the individual, community, and national levels to reduce emissions, exposures, and ecological impacts. Her microplastics and policy research was awarded the top thesis prize at the School of Public Policy and the Gold Prize at the 2021 Canadian National Student and Thought Leadership Awards competition. Further expanding her expertise in environmental research, she earned a Master of Environmental Science (MESc) from the Yale School of Environment, where she applied her research framework to Los Angeles, California.

To support evidence-based policymaking, Soma has authored two comprehensive reports for government bodies and presented her findings and recommendations to stakeholders, including government agencies, industry representatives, scientific communities, and the public. These contributions have informed policy discussions at various levels of government.

In 2023, Soma started her doctoral research under the guidance of Dr. Krystal Pollitt at the Yale School of Public Health. Her extensive multidisciplinary experience in microplastics research and expertise in policy analysis and knowledge translation form the foundation of her doctoral work. Her nuanced understanding of the critical knowledge gaps in microplastics exposure assessment and their implications for human health and public policy positioned her as a valuable addition to the Pollitt Lab team.

As part of her research exploring the links between airborne pollutant exposures and climate change, Soma is currently a Fellow of the Yale Center on Climate Change and Health where she is undertaking a pilot study to characterize human exposures in wildfire events in urban areas. With support from the Yuet Mei Chin Innovation Fund, she aims to comprehensively analyze microplastics and their chemical degradation products before, during, and after wildfire events and evaluate their toxicological relevance. Given the increasing incidence of wildfires due to climate change, her work will provide insights into the health impacts of these extreme events and contribute to the development of targeted intervention strategies and solutions.