Elsie M. Sunderland

Elsie M. Sunderland is a Canadian toxicologist and environmental scientist and the Gordon McKay Professor of Environmental Chemistry at Harvard University. She studies processes through which human activities increase and modify pollutants in natural ecosystems and living systems. Research Sunderland's research attempts to trace how the introduction of synthetic chemical compounds into the natural environment affects the global environment and food supplies of animals and people. Sunderland refers to the accelerating use of anthropogenic chemicals as civilization’s "global chemical experiment” that is affecting all continents and life on Earth. Her research seeks to track and quantify where these compounds go in the environment, and how they make their way into the tissues of wildlife and humans. The Global Chemical Experiment Sunderland and her research group at Harvard seek to model and quantify how human actions affect natural habitats and human food supplies, such as fish. The group develops mathematical models and conducts laboratory measurements of physical samples collected from ecosystems in order to develop mechanistic understanding that can inform policy and the public. These efforts seek to quantify and understand the “fate and transport” of natural and synthetic compounds.