Dr. Kaufman is a physician-epidemiologist, board-certified in internal medicine and occupational medicine. He has been a full-time faculty member at the UW since 1997, currently holding appointments in the Departments of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences, and Medicine (General Internal Medicine), and Epidemiology. He also serves as the Director of the UW Center for Exposures, Diseases, Genomics and Environment at DEOHS.

In 2019, Dr Kaufman was named editor-in-chief of Environmental Health Perspectives, a leading environmental health journal published by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. He is an elected member of the US National Academy of Medicine.

Dr. Kaufman's work integrates epidemiology, exposure sciences, toxicology and clinical medicine. His current research activities are primarily focused on environmental factors in chronic diseases. He is the principal investigator of a major epidemiological prospective cohort study of air pollution and cardiovascular disease (The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis and Air Pollution, or “MESA Air”). He directs the UW Northlake Controlled Exposure Facility, a facility customized for experimental inhalation toxicology studies on health effects of combustion products, including diesel exhaust.