Drexel University's Dornsife School of Public Health has experienced an extraordinary increase in our research engagement over the past few years. Our research continues to inspire change in urban and global health policy and practice.

"We strive to link our research to our policy and practice mission in a way that is valuable for practice but that also promotes creativity, innovation and the intellectual thrill of research itself," said Ana V. Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, Dean Emerita and Distinguished University Professor of Epidemiology.

Drexel University maintains the highest university research activity ranking, "R1 Doctoral University — Very High Research Activity," awarded by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions. The R1 classification is a testament to Dornsife's growing reputation as a comprehensive public health research school.

Learn more about Faculty Research Interests by topic.

Select Grants, Announcements, and Accolades

10/28/24: Dornsife's Urban Health Collaborative (UHC) received an inaugural A Better Tomorrow Award at the 2024 Mobility Conference for its contributions to improving climate, health, and equity in Philadelphia and beyond. Josiah Kephart, PhD, MPH, assistant professor, accepted the award on behalf of the UHC.

7/18/24: A longitudinal study examining the controlled use of cannabis among adults was funded by the National Institutes on Drug Abuse. Stephen Lankenau, PhD, professor and director of the Drexel Medical Cannabis Research Center, is one of the principal investigators on the R01 study, “Medical Marijuana, Emerging Adults, and Community: Connecting Health and Policy.”

7/11/24: Reneé H. Moore, PhD, research professor and associate dean of DEIB, and fellow researchers won the San Francisco University of California Stress Measurement Network's first-place award for empirical human/clinical research for their paper, "Network stressors, personal stressors, and ambulatory blood pressure in African-American women—Does superwoman schema play a role?"

5/21/24: Jourdyn A. Lawrence, PhD, MSPH, Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and the Drexel FIRST program, was named Health and Wellness Coordinator on a 10-member committee that will study the possibility of reparations in Philadelphia.

5/20/24: Stephanie Hernandez, PhD, MS, Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and the Drexel FIRST program, received Drexel's 2024 Student Organization Advisor of the Year Award for advising Dornsife's Undergraduate Student Government Organization. This Student Life Impact Award is given to an outstanding mentor who has impacted the growth and development of an organization and its student leaders.

5/15/24:: Drexel's 2023-2024 Faculty Recognition Awards honored Brian Lee, PhD, associate professor of Epidemiology, with the Provost Award for Outstanding Scholarly Productivity - Mid Career and Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH, assistant professor of Epidemiology and co-director of the Urban Health Collaborative, with the Provost Award for Outstanding Scholarly Productivity - Early Career. These awards are given annually by Drexel's Office of Research & Innovation and Office of Faculty Advancement.

5/03/24: The Latino Health Collective, which is led by Ana Martinez-Donate, PhD, professor, Community Health & Prevention and Mariana Lazo, MD, PhD, ScM, associate research professor, Community Health & Prevention, received a 2024 Public Health Service Award from the College of Physicians of Philadelphia's Section on Public Health and Preventive Medicine in the category of organization or group. The award recognizes organizations whose mission targets enhancing the health of citizens, neighborhoods, and/or communities in the Greater Philadelphia region.

3/29/24: Arthur Frank, MD, PhD, professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at Dornsife, was named a nominee of the 2024 John P. Wyatt Environment and Health Award by the University of Kentucky. This award is given by the University of Kentucky for outstanding accomplishments in environmental health.

3/4/24: Several members of the Dornsife community presented at the ENAR International Biometric Society Spring Meeting in Baltimore (March 10-13) and the Society of Behavioral Medicine's (SBM) 45th Annual Meeting & Scientific Sessions in Philadelphia (March 13–16). Learn more.

2/29/24: The Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements & Population Health Equity, Dornsife School of Public Health, is leading a $6M health equity project funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation that will address structural racism within the healthcare industry. The Ubuntu Center is led by Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, assistant professor of epidemiology at Dornsife.

11/30/23: Dornsife's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice (CNSJ) was once again selected to receive a grant from the Philadelphia Eagles through the Eagles Social Justice Fund. CNSJ's executive director is Arturo Zinny, LPC, MA, PhD(c), assistant clinical professor in the Department of Community Health and Prevention.

11/08/23: Joseph Amon, PhD, MSPH, clinical professor and director of the Office of Global Health, was appointed the editor-in-chief of the Health and Human Rights Journal. The journal is co-published by Drexel Dornsife and Harvard University’s François-Xavier Bagnoud (FXB) Center for Health and Human Rights.

11/07/23: Dornsife's Urban Health Collaborative received a multi-million dollar grant from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to establish the Drexel Climate Change and Urban Health Research Center. The center will be based at Drexel with additional research centers at the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Sao Paolo in Brazil, and the Institute of Nutrition of Central America and Panama in Guatemala. The Urban Health Collaborative is directed by Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, and co-directed by Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH.

10/09/23: The Philadelphia Department of Public Health awarded Dornsife School of Public Health researchers $399,184 to lead a mixed methods evaluation of Philly Joy Bank, a guaranteed income pilot program that will support pregnant Philadelphians. Allison Groves, PhD, associate professor of community health and prevention, Dornsife School of Public Health, and Elizabeth Salerno Valdez, PhD, assistant professor of community health and prevention, Dornsife School of Public Health, are co-principal investigators.

9/29/23: Dornsife received a 5-year $20 million award through the NIH's Community Partnerships to Advance Science for Society (ComPASS) program to lead a national coordinating center that will study health equity solutions.

Principal investigators Amy Carroll-Scott, PhD, associate professor and chair of Community Health and Prevention, and Jan M. Eberth, PhD, professor and chair of Health Management and Policy, will lead the center and its multidisciplinary team.

Dr. Carroll-Scott also received a $400,000 Barra Foundation grant for DSPH to partner with the Community Research Review Board in the West Philadelphia Promise Zone Community to transform how traditional Institutional Review Boards review and approve their studies.

8/08/23: Agus Surachman, PhD, assistant professor of epidemiology in the Dornsife School of Public Health, with a secondary appointment in the College of Nursing and Health Professions, and other co-principal investigators received $50,000 in pilot funding from Jefferson University’s Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center — Drexel University Consortium for a project titled: “Financial Hardship, Daily Stress Process, and Inflammation Among Cancer Survivors.”

7/28/23: Mariana Lazo, MD, PhD, ScM, associate research professor, department of Community Health and Prevention and the Urban Health Collaborative, and her team received an NIH R01 grant to address large and sustained liver disease disparities. The team includes research partners at the Lundquist Institute for Biomedical Innovation at Harbor-UCLA.

7/14/23: Researchers led by Esther Chernak, MD, MPH, FACP, Director of the Center for Public Health Readiness and Communication (CPHRC) and Clinical Professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at DSPH and the College of Medicine, and Melissa Kaufman, EdD, Interim Associate Dean for Education, received a grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Health to develop training programs in infection control and emergency preparedness for nursing home and long-term care facilities’ staff.

7/13/23: Longjian Liu, MD, PhD, associate professor at Dornsife School of Public Health, has been awarded a 2-year National Institutes of Health R21 grant of $403,090 to investigate the intricate connections between vascular and metabolic disorders and their potential influence on the development of cognitive impairment and dementia in older adults. This study will investigate the predictive significance of various factors, including phenotypes and genotypes, in relation to the risk of cognitive impairment and dementia onset in this population.

6/16/23: Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, assistant professor and director of the Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements and Population Health Equity at the Dornsife School of Public Health, received the Sherman A. James Diverse and Inclusive Epidemiology Award at the Society for Epidemiologic Research annual meeting in Portland, OR. This award recognizes an individual who has demonstrated research, teaching, or service that expands the scope of the field to underrepresented or disadvantaged populations or researchers, and with an impact that has facilitated greater diversity and inclusiveness.

6/16/23: Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH, assistant professor at the Dornsife School of Public Health and the Urban Health Collaborative (UHC), was awarded the Brian MacMahon Early Career Epidemiologist Award at the Society for Epidemiologic Research annual meeting in Portland, OR. This award recognizes early career epidemiologists who have already made substantial contributions to the field and are poised to become future leaders in epidemiology.

5/22/23: Jan M. Eberth, PhD, professor and chair of the department of Health Management and Policy at the Dornsife School of Public Health, received a $764K American Cancer Society research scholar grant to assess equity in shared decision making, utilization, and outcomes of lung cancer screening.

5/02/23: Brian Lee, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology, received a 5-year National Institutes of Health (NIH) R01 grant of $4M to study possible links between neurodevelopmental disorders and the risk of developing neurodegenerative disorders later in life.

3/08/23: Alex Quistberg, PhD, MPH, assistant research professor with the Drexel Urban Health Collaborative, and a multidisciplinary team were awarded a grant to link urban health outcomes to climate change and contribute to AI risk models.

2/15/23: Alina Schnake-Mahl, ScD, MPH, assistant professor of health management and policy and Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH, assistant professor of epidemiology, provided an invited commentary in the American Journal of Epidemiology on a recent article by Dimitris et al., where they discuss social epidemiologic lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Schnake-Mahl and Bilal write that a "better investment in public health infrastructure [is] a crucial step toward achieving population health equity."

2/01/23: Jane Clougherty, MSc, ScD, professor, and Anneclaire De Roos, PhD, MPH, associate professor, both in the department of Environmental and Occupational Health at the Dornsife School of Public Health, were named research members of the Philadelphia Regional Center for Children's Environmental Health, housed within the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and Penn Medicine. This new center will address threats to children's environmental health.

Through the EPA's Science to Achieve Results (STAR) program, Clougherty will also be leading research that identifies the key community stressors to alleviate the impacts of climate change on children’s health in Upstate New York.

1/30/23: Jaquelyn Jahn, PhD, MPH, assistant professor in the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and The Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements and Population Health Equity, was awarded $347K by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in January 2023. This funding allows Jahn to study the consequences of ending cash bail for community health equity.

1/13/23: Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, assistant professor and director of the Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements and Population Health Equity at Dornsife, was featured in a Diverse Issues in Higher Education Emerging Scholar piece about her career, advocacy, and more.

1/13/23: Marla J. Gold, MD, professor in the department of Health Management and Policy, dean emerita of Dornsife, and Drexel’s senior vice provost, community health and chief wellness officer, was named the recipient of the 2022-2023 Phyllis Marciano, MD '60, Woman in Medicine Award. Drexel University’s College of Medicine honored Gold for her leadership, mentorship, and patient care.

1/04/23: Tran Huynh, PhD, MPH, CIH, assistant professor in the Environmental and Occupational Health department, was selected for the Asian Pacific American Women’s Leadership Institute (APAWLI). The program promotes the leadership of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) women in the public and private sectors by fostering the development of whole-person leaders. Throughout 2023, Huynh will participate in leadership training that culminates with developing and implementing an impact project.

2022

12/21/22: Jane Clougherty, MSc, ScD, professor in the department of Environmental and Occupational Health, wrote an invited perspective piece, "Temporality and Recursive Dynamics in Stress–Pollution Interactions," for Environmental Health Perspectives. The piece discusses epidemiologic evidence that found chronic psychosocial stress may increase susceptibility to environmental pollutants.

12/1/22: Dornsife's Epidemiology and Biostatistics department was recognized by AmStat News for its efforts to "embed justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (JEDI) into [the department's] development and growth." The article includes a Q&A with Reneé H. Moore, PhD, research professor, director of the Biostatistics Scientific Collaboration Center, and director of diversity, equity & inclusion for the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and Leslie McClure, PhD, Dornsife professor and chair of epidemiology and biostatistics.

11/15/22: The Center for Firefighter Injury Research & Safety Trends at Dornsife was awarded an Innovative Public Health Curriculum honorable mention for their FIRE Fellowship from the Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health. Last month the center also received a new grant from FEMA's Assistance to Fire Grants Fire Prevention and Safety Program to develop a diversity, equity, and inclusion toolkit in partnership with the Metropolitan "Metro" Fire Chiefs Association. The FIRST Center is directed by Jennifer Taylor, PhD.

11/03/22: Alina Schnake-Mahl, ScD, MPH, assistant professor of health management and policy at the Dornsife School of Public Health, has been appointed as a Center for Public Health Law Research (CPHLR) Fellow at the Temple University Beasley School of Law for a two-year term. Schnake-Mahl will collaborate with faculty and staff at CPHLR on collaborative projects and grants in legal epidemiology.

11/01/22: Shiriki Kumanyika, PhD, a research professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention at the Dornsife School of Public Health, is the recipient of the Philip T. James Award by the World Obesity Federation. This award acknowledges outstanding achievement in the fields of obesity surveillance, prevention, and management.

10/14/22: Leah Schinasi, PhD, assistant professor in the department of Environmental and Occupational Health, was awarded a Harvard JPB Environmental Health Fellowship. The program supports junior faculty with demonstrated expertise and commitment towards addressing complex environmental health problems in under-resourced communities.

9/23/22: Nora Lee, PhD, assistant research professor in the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, has been selected as the first Title V Academic Fellow with the National MCH Workforce Development Center. The fellowship will allow Dr. Lee, a perinatal epidemiology researcher, to work with the Pennsylvania Department of Health and the Title V team to develop a collaborative project focused on infant safe sleep.

9/21/22: The inaugural Barry P. Katz Lectureship in Biostatistics and Health Data Science has been awarded to Leslie McClure, PhD, professor and chair of the Epidemiology and Biostatistics department and associate dean for faculty affairs.

9/08/22: Shiriki Kumanyika, PhD, a research professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention, was named to a five-member independent expert panel by the Reagan-Udall Foundation. The panel will evaluate the Food and Drug Administration’s human foods program.

9/01/22: Brisa Sánchez, PhD, Dornsife Endowed Professor of Biostatistics in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, stepped into the role of Associate Dean of Research at Dornsife. Since joining the school in 2019, Sanchez has been leading a large interdisciplinary research and training program, serving as a major collaborator in interdisciplinary research across the school, and mentoring students and junior faculty. Learn more about Dr. Sanchez.

7/28/22: Amy Carroll-Scott, PhD, MPH, associate professor and chair of the Department of Community Health and Prevention, was awarded the Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Program award, which is funded by the US Department of Justice. The award's goal is to reduce gun violence and promote the health of residents through collaborative strategies.

7/20/22: The Healing Hurt People program within the Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice was awarded a two-year Pew Fund venture grant from The Pew Charitable Trusts to address the growing impacts of community violence.

7/18/22: Arthur Frank, MD, PhD, professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at Dornsife, was named a Distinguished Fellow at the India International Centre. This is the beginning of an ongoing commitment to engaging in important occupational and environmental issues in India, including issues about asbestos exposures and air pollution issues as they affect school children.

7/01/22: The Drexel Medical Cannabis Research Center, which is directed by professor Stephen Lankenau, PhD, has awarded funding for two new pilot studies to researchers at the A.J. Drexel Autism Institute and the Drexel University College of Medicine.

6/30/22: Dornsife Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, was appointed co-chair of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine's Roundtable on Population Health Improvement.

6/29/22: Félice Lê-Scherban, PhD, MPH, training core lead at the Drexel Urban Health Collaborative and associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, was awarded an R01 grant to lead the project, "Food Insecurity, Neighborhood Environment, and Weight Trajectories in Young Children: Implications for Food Assistance Policy," funded by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

6/08/22: A project led by Jane Clougherty, MSc, ScD, associate professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, was awarded one of the Drexel Environmental Collaboratory's Inaugural Research Grants, which focus on climate change issues. The project team will monitor air pollutants and trace pollution sources in a vulnerable community in South Philadelphia, partnering with Lewis Clark State College, Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Philly Thrive. 7/13/23: An update on this initiative was published in the Summer 2023 issue of Drexel Magazine: Rowhomes Versus Refineries

6/07/22: Alina Schnake-Mahl, ScD, MPH, assistant research professor in Health Management and Policy and the Urban Health Collaborative, was awarded the Lilienfeld Postdoctoral Prize Paper Award at the Society for Epidemiologic Research. She will be giving a plenary talk at their conference in Chicago, IL.

6/06/22: Ana Ortigoza, MD, PhD, MPH, MS, senior research scientist II at the UHC is leading a collaboration between Salud Urbana en América Latina (SALURBAL) and the Committee on Data (CODATA) of the International Science Council for a project funded by the European Commission through its Horizon Europe Framework Programme.

5/23/22: Alex Ortega, PhD, Professor in the Dornsife School of Public Health, was awarded an NIH R01 grant to study Puerto Rico’s healthcare system following three major back-to-back public health disasters among its population.

Also, Ortega recently joined the NIH National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s Observational Study Monitoring Board (OSMB) for the Hispanic Community Health Study—Study of Latinos, which is a multi-center epidemiologic study in Hispanic/Latino populations to assess the role of acculturation in the prevalence and development of disease and identify factors playing a protective or harmful role in the health of Hispanics/Latinos.

4/22/22: Leslie McClure, PhD, Dornsife professor and chair of epidemiology and biostatistics, was elected to membership in the International Statistical Institute (ISI). ISI elected members are those who have made significant contributions to the statistical profession.

3/31/22: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation awarded Dornsife a $300,000 grant to support its scholars and their research as part of their Transforming Academia for Equity program. The project will be led by Scarlett Bellamy, ScD, Professor and Associate Dean for Diversity and Inclusion, and Reneé H. Moore, PhD, Research Professor, Director of the Biostatistics Scientific Collaboration Center (BSC), and Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion for the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics.

3/09/22: Alina Schnake-Mahl, ScD, MPH, assistant research professor in Health Management and Policy and the Urban Health Collaborative, was awarded a 5-year $637,000, K01from the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to study the social and policy determinants of COVID-19 and influenza disparities.

2/14/22: Jana Hirsch, PhD, assistant research professor in the Drexel Urban Health Collaborative, was recognized the National Institutes of Health’s ​​Collaborative Cohort of Cohorts for COVID Research (C4R) as an Early Career Investigator Awardee. Hirsch and colleagues will be analyzing data from over 47,000 U.S. adults to better understand COVID-19 risk and resilience.

2/13/22: Researchers from the Dornsife School of Public Health including Allison Groves, PhD, MHS, assistant professor, Alex Ezeh, PhD, MSc, professor, Luwam T. Gebrekristos, MPH, doctoral student, and Patrick D Smith, RN, doctoral student, co-led a publication in the Journal of Adolescent Health titled, “Adolescent Mothers in Eastern and Southern Africa: An Overlooked and Uniquely Vulnerable Subpopulation in the Fight Against HIV.” Their study examined the intersection between adolescent motherhood and HIV infection across 10 Eastern and Southern African countries.

2/01/22: Reneé H. Moore, PhD, a research professor and director of the Biostatistics Scientific Collaboration Center, and Loni Philip Tabb, PhD, an associate professor, both in the Dornsife School of Public Health, were featured in Feb. 1 AMSTAT News profiles on their career achievements. Each talks about how an internship/co-op set them on their path, and both share a love of mathematics, mentoring, teaching, and research. Read more in AMSTAT's profile of Reneé H. Moore, PhD and profile of Loni Philip Tabb, PhD.

1/04/22: Dornsife's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice was one of 32 Philadelphia nonprofits to receive a grant from the Philadelphia Eagles for anti-violence efforts. The Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice is directed by John Rich, MD, MPH, professor in the department of Health Management and Policy.

1/04/22: In Vol. 43 of the Annual Reviews of Public Health, Dornsife Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, highlights key substantive areas of focus in social epidemiology over the past 30 years, reflects on major advances and insights, and identifies challenges and possible future directions. The piece was titled, “Social Epidemiology: Past, Present, and Future.”

2021

12/21/21: Dornsife's Urban Health Collaborative was awarded a $250,000 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant to study the impacts of paid maternity and paternity leave policies on health outcomes in Latin America and their potential for the United States. The project will be led by Ana Ortigoza, MD, PhD, MPH, MS, senior research scientist II, Urban Health Collaborative, and Ana V. Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, Dean of the Dornsife School of Public Health and Director, Urban Health Collaborative.

12/09/21: The Maternal and Child Health Program (MCH) at the Dornsife School of Public Health was named one of three national recipients of the 2022 ATMCH Innovative Teaching Award. The MCH program will partner with the MCH Catalyst Program at the University at Albany, State University of New York to develop and implement a collaborative MCH course project. The project will foster collaborative teaching and learning across institutions as well as provide networking opportunities for students. Dornsife's MCH program director is Renee Turchi, MD, MPH, FAAP, clinical professor in the Community Health and Prevention department.

12/06/21: Pricila Mullachery, PhD, MPH, senior research scientist at the Drexel Urban Health Collaborative (UHC) was recently awarded a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Health Data for Action (HD4A) program, managed by AcademyHealth, to study social determinants of health and COVID-19 in a diverse cohort of patients in Greater Philadelphia. Leslie McClure, PhD, MS, Dornsife professor and chair of epidemiology and biostatistics and Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH, assistant professor at the UHC, will be co-investigators.

11/30/21: Arthur Frank, MD, PhD, professor in the department of Environmental and Occupational Health at the Dornsife School of Public Health, accepted a Visiting Professorship on an honorary basis at the Maulana Azad Medical College’s Centre of Occupational and Environmental Health (COEH) in New Delhi, India. At COEH, Frank will help strengthen the teaching and research activities.

11/25/21: Ali Groves, PhD, MHS, an assistant professor in the Community Health and Prevention department, led a team that published a longitudinal analysis of HIV and HSV-2 incidence among adolescent mothers in South Africa in JAIDS: Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.

11/15/21: Jennifer Taylor, PhD, Director of the Center for Firefighter Injury Research and Safety Trends (FIRST) at the Dornsife School of Public Health, and Chief Richard Marinucci, Executive Director of the Fire Department Safety Officers Association (FDSOA), received a $1.5 million grant to continue collaboration on firefighter safety projects designed to measurably change firefighter behavior and decision-making.

11/05/21: Sandra Bloom, MD, an associate professor and senior associate at the Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice at the Dornsife School of Public Health, was featured in a November article in Generocity about Philadelphia-area leaders whose work makes a difference. The piece recognizes Bloom’s commitment to trauma-informed care.

11/01/21: Shiriki Kumanyika, PhD, a research professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention at the Dornsife School of Public Health, was awarded The Obesity Society’s (TOS) Presidential Medal of Distinction for her excellence and national leadership in equity-focused obesity policies, implementation research and public health obesity efforts. The award was presented by Dr. Catherine Kotz, President of TOS, at the Obesity Week 2021 conference.

10/19/21: Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics and director of the Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements and Population Health Equity at the Dornsife School of Public Health, was appointed to The Lancet International Advisory Board for GRacE, their Group for Racial Equity.

10/15/21: Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, has been appointed Chair of the Observational Studies Monitoring Board (ORMB) for the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) REsearching COVID to Enhance Recovery (RECOVER) initiative. The RECOVER initiative will build a national study population of diverse research volunteers and support large-scale studies on the long-term effects of COVID-19.

10/14/21: The Dornsife School of Public Health and Drexel's College of Nursing and Health Professions received a 5-year, $14.4 million “Faculty Institutional Recruitment for Sustainable Transformation” (FIRST) grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to hire, retain and support diverse, early career researchers with a focus on health disparities research on aging, chronic disease and/or environmental determinants. Drexel is one of only six institutions to receive funding as part of the inaugural FIRST cohort.

10/11/21: Reneé H. Moore, PhD, research professor, director of the Biostatistics Scientific Collaboration Center (BSC), and director of diversity, equity and inclusion for the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Dornsife School of Public Health, was recognized for her service on the COVID-19 trials Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) as one of the public health heroes. An article titled “Data and Safety Monitoring of COVID-19 Vaccine Clinical Trials“ was published in the Journal of Infectious Disease in May 2021 about this service.

10/08/21: Jim Stimpson, PhD, professor of health management and senior associate dean for education, was accepted to the U.S. State Department's Fulbright Specialist Program, which offers U.S. academics and professionals the opportunity to complete a two- to six-week project at host institutions around the globe.

10/06/21: Leslie McClure, PhD, Dornsife professor and chair of epidemiology and biostatistics, was elected president of the Eastern North American Region of the International Biometric Society. The International Biometric Society promotes the development and application of statistical and mathematical theory and methods in the biosciences.

10/04/21: The Drexel Urban Health Collaborative was awarded $1.2 million to establish a training program for cardiovascular disease risk research in Central America. The training program, led by Brisa Sánchez, PhD, Dornsife Endowed Professor of Biostatistics in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Ana V. Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, Dean of the Dornsife School of Public Health and Director, Urban Health Collaborative, received the 5-year grant from the National Institutes of Health and the Fogarty International Center.

9/30/21: The Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice received a $1,927,538 five-year grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration (SAMHSA) to supplement its Healing Hurt People program as part of their National Child Traumatic Stress Initiative, which increases access to trauma-focused treatment and services systems for children and families who experience traumatic events.

9/24/21: At the sixth annual celebration of America’s Hispanic Heritage, the 2021 AL DÍA Archetypes event, Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, was among 10 outstanding Hispanic professionals to receive the 2021 Ambassador Manuel Torres Award. Dean Diez Roux was the honoree in the health category and was recognized for "her work on neighborhood health effects, [which] has been highly influential in the policy debate on population health and its determinants."

9/07/21: The National Institute of Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD) awarded $2.2M to a team of researchers led by Brent Langellier, PhD, MA, assistant professor of health management and policy at Dornsife, to study the factors that produce racial/ethnic and income disparities in healthy diets across Philadelphia neighborhoods. The team will examine the economic consequences of the pandemic, recent changes in key federal policies, and collaborate with stakeholders to assess promising policies that could be used to reduce diet disparities.

9/01/21: Dornsife's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice received a $1,579,649 four-year grant from the Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA) to add an experiential training component to our Community Health Worker/Certified Peer Specialist Training Academy. This experiential component will allow trainees to receive supported on-the-job experience to supplement their classroom experience. This grant will also allow for an evaluation of the training academy led by Amy Carroll-Scott, PhD, MPH.

8/26/21: Leslie McClure, PhD, Dornsife professor and chair of epidemiology and biostatistics, is co-leading a study at Drexel that aims to identify how race and gender barriers affect mid-career faculty women. Learn more about the study at Clearing Pathways for Women Faculty.

8/09/21: Scarlett Bellamy, ScD, professor and associate dean for diversity, inclusion and faculty development, was awarded the 2021 Lagakos Distinguished Alumni Award from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s Department of Biostatistics for her leadership in "research, education, service, and outreach." Bellamy will give a virtual lecture hosted by Harvard Chan's biostatistics department on October 14, 2021.

7/29/21: Results from a COVID project led by Jonathan Purtle, DrPH, MPH, MSc, associate professor of health management and policy at Dornsife, titled “Impacts of COVID-19 on Mental Health Safety Net Services for Youths: A National Survey of Agency Officials” were published in Psychiatric Services. The study presents results from their survey of 159 mental health agency officials from 46 states about their experiences meeting the mental health needs of youth during the pandemic which was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health.

7/01/21: The American Statistical Association's Biometrics and Mental Health Statistics sections awarded Loni Philip Tabb, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Dornsife, with the 2021 Annie T. Randall Innovator Award. The award honors Black female statistician Annie T. Randall and recognizes statistical innovators.

7/01/21: The Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice received a $425,000 grant from Philadelphia Works to provide two coed cohorts of its Community Health Worker/Certified Peer Specialist Training Academy, which prepares young people for careers in health and social services fields.

6/28/21: The Society for Epidemiologic Research presented Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH, with their Kenneth Rothman Career Accomplishment Award at their annual conference held virtually. Diez Roux's plenary address focused on her work to expand epidemiology beyond the individual to encompass social systems and the broader environmental factors so critical to health.

6/17/21: The City Council of Philadelphia honored and congratulated Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, assistant professor at Dornsife, for her appointment as Director of The Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements and Population Health Equity at Dornsife with a resolution. "Dr. Barber has committed to using her scholarship to make the invisible, visible; mobilize data for action; and contribute to the transnational dialogue around racism and health inequities," states the resolution.

6/16/21: Leslie McClure, PhD, professor and chair of the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and associate dean for faculty affairs at Dornsife, was awarded $274,000 by the University of Vermont’s Association of University Centers on Disabilities to study risk factors and the burden of COVID-19 related thrombosis and/or bleeding complications.

6/16/21: Michael LeVasseur, PhD, MPH, assistant teaching professor in the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and Michael Donnelly, MSc, a data scientist, were awarded by the Office of New York State Governor for co-founding COVIDoutlook.info for their commitment to providing accurate, scientific information to policymakers about the pandemic.

6/16/21: Alexis Roth, PhD, MPH, associate professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention at Dornsife, was awarded an NIH R01 grant for 4.9 million to conduct a randomized control trial to assess HIV prevention interventions over the next 5 years.

6/16/21: Ann Klassen, PhD, professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention, and Hee-Soon Juon, MSN, PhD, of Thomas Jefferson University, were awarded a 4-year National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases R01 grant to study the bio-psycho-social drivers of disparities in liver disease progression among Korean Americans with Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection.

6/08/21: Jana Hirsch, PhD, MES, assistant research professor at the Urban Health Collaborative (UHC), was recently awarded a 5-year, $4,358,351 R01 National Institute on Aging (NIA) grant for the project, “Contribution of Longitudinal Neighborhood Determinants to Cognitive Health and Dementia Disparities within a Multi-Ethnic Cohort.”

6/08/21: A new report created by the State Epidemiological Outcomes Workgroup (SEOW) that includes Philip Massey, PhD, MPH, associate professor of community health and prevention at Dorsnife and SEOW chair, was released by the PA Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs. This report found that Pennsylvania youth who identify with multiple groups across race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality may be at higher risk for substance use.

4/22/21: Brisa N. Sánchez, PhD, Dornsife Endowed Professor of Biostatistics, was appointed to the Census Bureau's National Advisory Committee on Racial, Ethnic and Other Populations.

4/19/21: Jana Hirsch, PhD, MES, assistant research professor at the Urban Health Collaborative at Dornsife, helped compile data for a new report outlining growing disparities in Pennsylvania for AARP. 

4/07/21: Ayden Scheim, PhD, assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Dornsife, received recognition as a Schulich Medicine & Dentistry Alumni of Distinction 2021. "Scheim has established himself as one of the world’s top experts in the field of transgender health," said the Schulich School.

3/26/21: New research “Public Opinion About Adverse Childhood Experiences: Social Stigma, Attribution of Blame, and Government Intervention” led by Jonathan Purtle, DrPH, MPH, MSc, associate professor of health management and policy at Dornsife, provided insights on perceptions surrounding childhood trauma. 

3/15/21: Ayden Scheim, PhD, assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Dornsife, was awarded $423,000 by the National Institute of Mental Health to study “Gendered Situated Vulnerabilities and Mental Health among Transgender Men in India.”

3/01/21: The Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice received a $299,972 two-year grant from the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency to establish a Community Outreach Team (COT). COT will embed clinical and peer staff in four youth-serving community-based organizations to engage and provide therapeutic services to young victims of trauma and provide referrals to Healing Hurt People when appropriate.

2/19/21: The research of Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, was featured in this month's issue of The Lancet. Read the article, Sharrelle Barber: At the Intersection of Place, Race, and Health.

2/15/21: Ann Carroll Klassen, PhD, professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention, had the article Formative Research to Address Vaccine Hesitancy in Tajikistan published in the March 2021 issue of Vaccine.

2/02/21: Urban Health Collaborative Director and Dornsife Dean Ana Diez Roux, MD, PhD, MPH and Assistant Professor Usama Bilal, MD, PhD, MPH, have been awarded a one year, $250,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to track equity issues in COVID-19 testing and vaccination.

The study will focus on building on the Big Cities Health Coalition (BCHC) COVID-19 Health Inequities in Cities Dashboard to characterize the availability and inequalities of COVID-19 testing, characterize policies that cities have implemented to reduce these inequities, and evaluate the effects of these policies. 

2/01/21: In celebration of Black History Month, Scarlett Bellamy, ScD, associate dean for diversity, inclusion, and faculty development & professor at Dornsife, was recognized by The American Statistical Association for making tremendous contributions to the field of statistics.

1/27/21: Suruchi Sood, PhD, associate professor in the department of Community Health and Prevention, continues her work with the UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), the largest global initiative to accelerate the abandonment of this harmful traditional practice and advance the rights, health and well-being of women and girls. Programme members released a new publication “Participatory Research Toolkit for Social Norms Measurement.” The toolkit is a culmination of almost two decades of social and behavior change communication research and practice collaborations from around the world and is intended to address social-norms change.

1/14/21: Harrison Quick, PhD, assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics, led a team of researchers at Dornsife to explore the utility of spatial Bayesian models to improve the precision of small area estimates used by the County Health Rankings. The published results lay the foundation for the use of modeled estimates in the Rankings, which uses modeled estimates for measures like premature death. Funding was provided by County Health Rankings & Roadmaps (CHR&R) in 2019.

1/15/21: Alex Ezeh, PhD, professor of Global Health in the department of Community Health and Prevention at Dornsife, will serve on the United Nation’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs’ High Level Advisory Board on Economic and Social Affairs. Ezeh will join 19 fellow board members to build on the accomplishments of the first HLAB. Over the next two years, they will continue to strengthen the United Nation’s thought leadership on sustainable development and to reinforce its impact at the forefront of sustainable development policy at global, regional, and local levels.

2020

11/09/20: Shiriki Kumanyika, PhD, was awarded funding through Drexel's Rapid Response Research & Development Fund. The project will investigate Drexel University’s response to racial inequities, police brutality and other social injustices experienced by Black people across the country, through the perceptions of students in the Drexel community. This research will be used to inform a model and best practice for developing transformative antiracism strategies that can be institutionally accountable and sustained. Global Engagement’s Director of Global Health Programs and the Dornsife Global Development Scholars Program Idris Robinson, MPH, will serve as manager.

10/07/20: Urban Health Collaborative Professor Alex Quistberg Awarded $690,000 K01 Award From NIH. Alex Quistberg, PhD, MPH, got an award for the Built Environment, Pedestrian Injuries and Deep Learning (BEPIDL) study, which will focus on developing neighborhood built environment indicators and examining their association with pedestrian safety in Bogota, Colombia.

10/01/20: Mariana Lazo, MD, PhD, ScM, associate research professor, and Ana Martinez-Donate, PhD, professor, both in the department of Community Health and Prevention, received COVID-19 supplement funding from an existing $275K R21 from NICHD grant.

The new additional budget of $250K will provide COVID-19 specific training to our cohort of Latino community leaders so they can support other community members with COVID-19 risk reduction, access to testing, and treatment. They will also be evaluating the impact of peer-driven intervention, as well as the Latino Health Collective and the crisolcontigo.com website led by this research group.

10/01/20: Casper Voyles, MPH, and Randall Sell, ScD, were awarded funding for “Investigating Sexual Minorities’ Navigation of Participation and Disclosure Decisions in Athletic Spaces,” $4,778, NIRSA Foundation, 10/1/2020 – 12/31/2022.

9/30/20: Tran Huynh, PhD, MPH, CIH; Amy Carroll-Scott, PhD, MPH; and Lucy Robinson, PhD, were awarded funding for “A feasibility study to develop a multilevel occupational health intervention program for nail salon employees and owners,” $234,996, NIOSH, 9/30/2020-9/29/2022, 1R21OH011740-01.

9/29/20: Professor Ortega Awarded $2.7 Million R01 Award From NIH. Alex Ortega, PhD, was awarded an NIH grant to study access to healthcare for Latino youth in mixed status families in California. Researchers that will address four specific goals in the context of families’ citizenship and documentation status compositions.

9/15/20: Seth Welles, PhD, ScD; Neal Goldstein, PhD, MBI; Alexis Roth, PhD, MPH; Ayden Scheim, PhD, and Zsofia Szep, MD, were awarded funding for “A Cross-Sectional Survey of PrEP Awareness, Barriers and Facilitators for PrEP Uptake, and the Impact of Dosing Mechanisms on Willingness to Take PrEP among MSM Indicated for PrEP Use in Philadelphia,” $236,554.89, Marck Sharp and Dohme Corp., 9/15/2020 – 3/15/2022.

9/01/20: Usama Bilal, PhD, MPH, MD; Neal Goldstein, PhD; and Mariana Lazo Elizondo, MD, PhD, ScM, were awarded funding for “The Health Consequences of Urban Scaling,” $377,709, NIH, 3DP5OD026429-03S1. The project proposes to uncover variability, trends, and predictors of inequities in COVID-19 among Hispanics.

9/01/20: Professor Barber Awarded $2.2 Million R01 Award From NIH. Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, will lead a research team that will examine how changing neighborhoods influence hypertension and diabetes control. Understanding these associations is critical for the prevention and management of cardiovascular disease risk factors in African Americans and the reduction of racial health inequalities.

8/31/20: Drexel Researchers Receive Funding for Racial Equity Projects - Just over $100,000 was awarded to 22 faculty and professional staff through Drexel's Rapid Response Research & Development Fund.

8/25/20: HRSA Names Dornsife a Maternal and Child Health Public Health Catalyst Program Grant Recipient. Dornsife's Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Program received funding to expand its MCH education and opportunities.

8/01/20: Tran Huynh, PhD, MPH, CIH, was awarded funding for “Occupational safety and health technical assistance,” $36,637.18, NIOSH, 8/1/2020 – 7/31/2021, 20IPA2014104.

7/31/20: Philip Massey, PhD, MPH, and Michael Yudell, PhD, MPH, were awarded funding for “Hashtag HPV: Engaging parents through social media to increase HPV vaccination,” $100,000, NCI. Read a related story, Social Leveraging, in the Dornsife SPH Magazine.

7/26/20: Irene Headen, PhD, MS, was awarded funding for “System Science Approaches to Understand Neighborhood Opportunity and Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Maternal Morbidity,” $664,704, NIMHD, 7/26/2020-2/28/2025, 1K01MD015291-01.

7/7/20: Alexis Roth, PhD, MPH, and Ayden Scheim, PhD, were awarded funding for “Comparing Treatment Outcomes for Opioid Use Disorder Before and After the COVID-19 Outbreak in Philadelphia: A Natural Experiment,” $32,400, Fordham University (NIDA), 7/7/2020-3/31/2021.

7/01/20: Scarlett Bellamy, ScD, was awarded funding for “Strengthening Suicide Prevention Efforts for Women Veterans through the Veterans Crisis Line,” $129,423, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, 7/1/2020 – 11/30/2022.

6/29/20: Suruchi Sood, PhD, was awarded funding for “C4D Capacity Building on Changing Social Norms Supporting Child Marriage,” $50,120, UNICEF, 6/29/2020-1/31/2021.

6/01/20: Sharrelle Barber, ScD, MPH, was awarded funding for “Racism, Residential Segregation and COVID-19 in Philadelphia: Mobilizing Data for Action During the Pandemic,” $10,000, Community Initiatives/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, 6/1/2020-9/30/2020. This project will examine residential segregation as a fundamental driver of the COVID-19 pandemic in urban settings. It will combine descriptive spatial data analyses and digital storytelling to examine the links between structural racism, residential segregation and COVID-19 pandemic in the city of Philadelphia. Ultimately, this project seeks to shape the narrative around emerging racial inequalities and mobilize data for action with a focus on both short-term and long-term policy solutions.

6/1/20: Meera Harhay, MD; Ann Klassen, PhD; Lucy Robinson, PhD; and Brandy-Joe Milliron, PhD, were awarded funding for “Identifying Health and High-Risk Weight Loss Phenotypes to Optimize Obesity Management in End Stage Kidney Disease,” $1,421,103, NIDDK, 6/1/2020 – 5/31/2025, 1R01DK124388-01.

5/21/20: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Drexel's Rapid Response Research and Development Fund Awardees

Peer-Reviewed Publications

Visit PubMed for a recent list of Dornsife's peer-reviewed publications authored by faculty, students and staff at the school.