Kristin Knox, PhD

Dr. Kristin Knox joined Silent Spring in June 2019 with a background in data science. Her work is focused on the quantitative analysis of exposure patterns and predictors, both to increase our understanding of the health risks associated with hazardous chemicals and to reduce exposures.

In recent work, Dr. Knox used her skills to assess the efficacy of California’s landmark right-to-know law, Proposition 65. This included repurposing a dataset collected by the California Air Resources Board to regulate smog, using the data to instead evaluate the presence of volatile carcinogens and reproductive/developmental toxicants in consumer products. She also analyzed NHANES biomonitoring data from the CDC to evaluate the impact of Prop 65 on population-level toxic exposures, comparing California to the rest of the United States, as well as trends over time.

Currently, Dr. Knox is investigating occupational exposures to breast cancer-relevant chemicals, with a specific focus on immigrant women. She is part of a team that is using both targeted and non-targeted techniques to evaluate breast cancer-relevant occupational exposures faced by nurses, a project of the Women Workers Biomonitoring Collaborative.

Dr. Knox holds a PhD in Business Economics as well as master’s and bachelor’s degrees in Economics from Harvard University. Her doctoral research focused on the relationship between firms’ corporate governance structures and the prices they pay for their bank loans. She has since used her data science skills in a variety of non-profit settings, mostly focused on the fields of education and public health. Dr. Knox served as Acting Director of Harvard’s Office of Institutional Research. She also completed a study of maternal health outcomes in Haiti for Partners in Health.

In her spare time, Dr. Knox loves to cook and to travel with her family.