Cynthia Curl Profile

Assistant Professor
Community and Environmental Health

Email: cynthiacurl@boisestate.edu
Phone Number: (208) 426-3924

Link to personal webpage(s)

Agricultural Health at Boise State

Dr. Cynthia Curl’s research interests are focused on environmental health and exposure science, with a particular emphasis on understanding exposures to agricultural chemicals and their effects on farmworkers, agricultural communities and the general public. She has authored numerous peer-reviewed publications on this topic, describing studies of the effectiveness of various agricultural re-entry periods on worker exposures, research on the “take-home” pathway of exposure on families of agricultural workers, and investigations of the effect of organic diets on pesticide exposures to the general public.

Active research projects in her lab currently include:

• Measuring dietary and agricultural exposure to glyphosate (“Round Up”) among pregnant women in Idaho
• Assessment of risk factors for health disparities among Latina farm workers
• Evaluating crop uptake of inorganic bromide following field fumigation with the nematicide methyl bromide
• Reducing health and safety hazards in potato production

All of this work aims to understand how our agricultural production methods impact human health and seeks to help consumers make informed decisions about what to eat and what to feed their families.

Agricultural production methods play a tremendously important role in climate resiliency. I’m interested in any collaborations that explore how we can produce our food more sustainably, using a very broad definition of sustainability that includes environmental and public health, as well as environmental justice and worker justice.

• Rachel Phinney, Master’s student
• Karen Sanchez, Undergraduate student
• Allondra Murillo, Undergraduate student
• Emily Pape, Undergraduate student
• Kalie Gydesen, Undergraduate student

• HLTH 480/480G

• Idaho State Department of Agriculture
• Idaho Potato Commission
• Washington State Potato Commission
• Women, Infants and Children (WIC) clinics of the Central District Health Department