Research Trainees of 2020

Koshiq Hossain
- Faculty Mentor: Andrea Baccarelli
- School: Hunter College
Project: The Effect of Lead on DNA Subtelomeric Methylation and Cognitive Ability in the Elderly

One in four people in the world will be affected by mental or neurological disorders at some point in their lives. Every year there are 10 million new cases of dementia. Experimental and epidemiological research has shown that environmental exposures to black carbon and lead may accelerate cognitive decline. Researchers have found that subtelomeric regions are more methylated in Alzheimer’s Disease individuals than in controls, and it has been proposed as a characteristic of Alzheimer’s Disease. Subtelomeric methylation is a regulator of telomere length, a proposed biomarker of biological aging. Alzheimer’s Disease is also characterized by high rates of oxidative damage, which could be modifying telomere length through demonstrated changes in subtelomeric methylation.
Lea Jean-Francois
- Faculty Mentor: Brandon Pearson
- School: Barnard College
Project: Usage of Instability Index to Determine if Chemicals Disrupt Trinucleotide Repeats in Huntington’s Disease

Huntington's Disease is a severe neurodegenerative disorder resulting from expanded CAG nucleotide repeats in the Huntington (HTT) gene. Instability in the expansion of the repeat sequence can lead to ongoing instability as a result of environmental chemical exposures. Investigation utilizes cell models of Huntington’s disease to determine if pesticide exposure expands CAG repeats that leads to an increase in repeat instability.
Salwa Najmi
- Faculty Mentor: Micaela Martinez
- School: Hunter College
Project: COVID-19 Disparities in NYC: Active Digitization and Analysis

In March 2020, the World Health Organization formally declared COVID-19, the disease brought on by the severe syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), as a global pandemic. The CDC has indicated that racial and ethnic disparities in COVID-19 may be partially attributable to socioeconomic disadvantages requiring some individuals to continue working outside, limiting their ability to adequately social distance and quarantine in their homes. By analyzing data released by the New York City Department of Health, MTA, as well as Traffic data, we hope to better understand how disparities in the COVID-19 public health crisis may be related to essential work, and thereby an inability to effectively social distance.
Han Oo
- Faculty Mentor: Julie Herbstman
- School: Fordham College
Project: The Neighborhood Quality and Positive Health

Positive health is a new approach of measuring health that can be characterized as both a function of positive and negative resources. The positive aspects allow children with chronic illness to utilize their own skills to promote well-being by adapting to environmental challenges, obtaining goals, fulfilling needs while the negative aspects such as their chronic illness lead to a limitation or interference in their functioning. This measure of positive health provides more context about what “Health”, which is traditionally measured as an absence of illness. Neighborhood quality, which is measured using a self-perceived neighborhood quality reported by the guardian, affects one's positive health. By analyzing neighborhood quality and positive health, we hope to explore the question of what healthy aging is and examine predictors of positive health.
Dahiana Pena
- Faculty Mentor: Matt Perzanowski
- School: Columbia College
Project: Parasympathetic Nervous System Activity and Exercise-Induced Bronchoconstriction

The autonomic nervous system, which consists of the parasympathetic and sympathetic branches, regulates involuntary movements such as heartbeat and bronchodilation/bronchoconstriction of the lungs. Studies have indicated that there is an association between the asthma phenotype exercise induced wheeze and dysregulated activity of the autonomic nervous system. For this project we measured heart rate variability (HRV), which is an index for parasympathetic vagal activity, in young-adult asthmatics. We conducted data analysis to determine the relationship between parasympathetic activity (measured through HRV) and Exercise-Induced Bronchoconstriction.
Charlene Redhead*
- Faculty Mentor: Norman Kleiman
- School: Hunter College
Project: Heavy Metal Contamination in Hair From Feral Dogs in Chernobyl

34 years after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the subsequent multi-year cleanup, thousands of individuals continue to work on remediation, deconstruction, and in two newly constructed nuclear fuel reprocessing facilities. In addition to continuing public health concerns regarding radioactive contamination, the area surrounding the reactors and surrounding military-industrial complex is likely also contaminated with a variety of heavy and toxic metals. To model potential human health risks in the region, hair samples from feral dog populations within the Exclusion Zone were analyzed for toxic metal content. When compared to samples from control animals, data indicates significantly higher concentrations of numerous potentially toxic and/or carcinogenic metals in hair samples from dogs living alongside workers in the Exclusion Zone.
Monique Slowly
- Faculty Mentor: Regina Santella and Hui-Chen Wu
- School: Columbia College
Project: Blood DNA Methylation and Liver Cancer: Evidence From Strong Heart Study

Liver cancer incidence has risen over the past 10 years in the United States, especially in American Indian populations. Along with genetic and environmental factors, epigenetic alterations such as DNA methylation can contribute to cancer development. Blood cell DNA methylation can be used as a biomarker to assess cancer risk. In order to evaluate the association between liver cancer mortality and blood DNA methylation, an epigenome wide association study was conducted to identify CpG sites of significance with relation to liver cancer.