Professor Frank Kelly obtained his PhD from Queen’s University Belfast in Physiology and subsequently worked as a postdoctoral fellow at Pennsylvania State University. He became a Senior Lecturer at St Thomas’s Hospital before moving to King’s College London as a Professor of Environmental Health and Director of the Environmental Research Group. His group transferred to Imperial College London in 2020, where he continues to serve as the Director of the Environmental Research Group, Director of the NIHR Health Protection Research Unit in Health Impact of Environmental Hazards and Deputy Director of the MRC Centre for Environment & Health. He holds the inaugural Humphrey Battcock Chair in Community Health and Policy, within the School of Public Health in the global centre of air pollution research.
The substantial research activity, over which he presides, spans all aspects of air pollution research from toxicology through to science policy. This experimental research examines the toxicity of airborne particulate matter, diesel and biodiesel exhaust emissions, wood smoke and identifies of biomarkers of exposure. A new area of investigation is ambient microplastics, where his work focusses on their identification, detection and potential health effects. He has led studies on the urban airshed within London, including the impact of the introduction of London’s Congestion Charging Zone and the Ultra Low Emission Zone. During his leadership at King’s, the London Air Quality Network developed into a first class dissemination and education resource for London residents.
Professor Kelly has published over 450 peer-reviewed papers as well as many conference papers and books (as author or editor) on the toxicology and health effects of ozone, nitrogen dioxide and particulate pollution. He provides policy support to the World Health Organisation on air pollution issues and is a member of the Health Effects Institute (HEI) Review Committee. He is past Chairman of COMEAP, the UK’s Department of Health’s Expert Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants, past President of the European Society for Free Radical Research and past Chairman of the British Association for Lung Research.