Faculty Directory
A key goal of the Center is to bring together faculty working on cutting edge research in topics related to healthy aging. Currently, the Center has 85 faculty affiliates across 7 colleges and 23 departments. If you are interested in being a Center for Healthy Aging affiliate faculty member, please fill out this survey, and we will be in touch.
| Name | Research Area | Research Expertise | Department | College |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jianguo Zhao | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Design and control of robotics devices | Mechanical Engineering | College of Engineering |
| Stu Tobet | Comparative Aging; Biology and Physiology of Aging | Structures in the brain that control neuroendocrine functions; Microbiome and aging | School of Biomedical Engineering | College of Engineering |
| Zhijie Wang | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Cardiovascular biomechanics at different scales (single segment of artery to whole organs including the heart and lungs) | Mechanical Engineering | College of Engineering |
| Allyson Brothers | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Promotion of healthy aging throughout the lifespan; attitudes toward aging and awareness of age-related change; the influence of attitudes toward aging on health, well-being, and health behaviors; rural aging experiences | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Laura Malinin | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Age-related cognitive decline and enriched environments | Design and Merchandising | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Chris Gentile | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Novel treatments to preserve endothelial function in aging | Food Science and Human Nutrition | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Sarah Johnson | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Functional foods, cardiovascular disease and post-menopausal women | Food Science and Human Nutrition | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Tom LaRocca | Comparative Aging; Biology and Physiology of Aging; Cognitive, Brain, and Behavioral Aging | Biological Mechanisms of Aging, Interventions for Increasing Healthspan | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Chris Bell | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Diabetes; control of blood glucose in aging | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Barry Braun | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Effects of physical activity and pharmacology on prevention and management of type 2 diabetes | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Frank Dinenno | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Regulation of blood flow and how the basic control mechanisms become impaired with aging and disease | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Brett Fling | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Neuromechanics, brain imaging, gait and balance in Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson’s, Aging | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Karyn Hamilton | Comparative Aging; Biology and Physiology of Aging | Integrative approach to studying age-associated chronic diseases, primarily focused on how to maintain muscle, both skeletal and cardiac, over the lifespan | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Dan Lark | Biology and Physiology of Aging | The contribution of secreted extracellular vesicles (i.e., exosomes) to age-related metabolic disease | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Heather Leach | Biology and Physiology of Aging; Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Physical activity interventions to minimize recurrence and optimize physical health and well-being in cancer survivors | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Neha Lodha | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Neurophysiology and motor skill rehabilitation in stroke and TIA | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Brian Tracy | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Examining the mechanisms that explain neuromuscular decline with aging and the physical functional consequences of the changes | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Allison Bielak | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Normal and pathological cognitive changes in adulthood; influence of lifestyle factors on cognitive aging; intraindividual variability in cognitive speed and how it relates to cognitive ability, health, and possible dementia prediction | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Aga Burzynska | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Interconnections between brain structure and function, cognitive functioning, and physical health in older age | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Manfred Diehl | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Awareness of age-related change and its role in successful aging; personality development in adulthood and its contribution to successful aging; experience and regulation of emotion in adulthood | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Christine Fruhauf | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Grandparent and grandchild relationships; grandparents raising grandchildren; GLBT grandparenting | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Gloria Luong | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Socioemotional dynamics and emotion regulation across the life-span; emotional and physiological stress reactivity and recovery; developmental links between social relationships, emotions, health, and well-being | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Karen Atler | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Satisfaction and meaningfulness of time use and everyday activity | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Anita Bundy | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Fitness to drive; everyday time use | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Aaron Eakman | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Meaningfulness of everyday activity; behavioral (i.e., non-pharmacological) interventions to promote sleep | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Mackenzi Pergolotti | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Occupational therapy interventions for older adults with cancer; policy and management of large data sets esp. related to uptake of therapeutic interventions; disparities in access to health care | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Arlene Schmid | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Complementary and integrative therapies such as yoga for fall prevention in older adults and people with stroke or other neuro conditions; self-management of chronic conditions | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Wendy Wood | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Long term care residential care for dementia; animal-assisted interventions for older adults | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Eunhee Choi | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Aging, health, and policy, particularly for older workers and volunteers; research methodology and program evaluation. | Social Work | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Eric Ross | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Yeast prions as a model for amyloid diseases, including Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, and transmissible spongiform encephalopathies | Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Michael Thomas | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Schizophrenia, aging, and dementia; Development of tests to improve the collection and interpretation of cognitive and brain imaging data | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Tingting Yao | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Regulatory mechanisms in DNA repair and gene expression; ubiquitin signaling in macroautophagy | Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Shrideep Pallickara | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Cloud computing, distributed systems, content distribution networks, streaming systems | Computer Science | College of Natural Sciences |
| Deana Davalos | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Understanding the development of time processing abilities over the life span, including older adults, with emphasis on processing time accurately | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Ed DeLosh | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Aging and memory, including effects of physical fitness on age-related declines in memory | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Gwen Fisher | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Health and well-being among older workers; retirement, work ability, and prolonged working life; work/non-work interface, including work/non-work conflict, enhancement, and work/life balance. | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Matt Rhodes | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Understanding individual differences in memory, including the impact of healthy aging on memory function | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Silvia Sara Canetto | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Cultural scripts of suicide and hastened death, and the paradox of US older-adult White men's suicide vulnerability. Stereotypes of gender, sexual orientation, and aging. | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Susan Bailey | Comparative Aging; Biology and Physiology of Aging | Role of chromosomes and telomeres in cancer and other human disease states, tumorigenesis and aging | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Adam Chicco | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Various aspects of heart health and disease from the molecular to systemic levels and relation to aging | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Frederic Hoerndli | Biology and Physiology of Aging | C. elegans genetics and in vivo microscopy to study synaptic aging and neurodegeneration | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Seonil Kim | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Neurobiological mechanisms in Aging and Alzheimer’s disease | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Julie Moreno | Biology and Physiology of Aging; Comparative Aging | Cellular stress mechanisms in protein misfolding neurodegenerative diseases and aging | Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Mike Tamkun | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Neuronal response to stroke/ischemia. Cell biology of traumatic brain injury | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Susan Tsunoda | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Drosophila genetics to study neurodegenerative disease; Aging and Alzheimer’s disease | Biomedical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Ron Tjalkens | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Neuroinflammatory mechanisms in neurodegenerative disorders, particularly disorders of the basal ganglia such as manganism and Parkinson’s disease | Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Edward Hoover | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Prion biology | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Candace Mathiason | Comparative Aging; Biology and Physiology of Aging | Prion pathobiology, pathogenesis, trafficking, and transmission dynamics with emphasis on blood-borne prions and asymptomatic disease stage | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Kelly Santangelo | Biology and Physiology of Aging; Comparative Aging | Osteoarthritis, aging, and obesity: Translational analyses that combine therapeutic interventions with molecular mechanisms, advanced imaging, and assessments of mobility | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Glenn Telling | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Mechanism of prion replication, prion species barriers and strain diversity, and the molecular basis of inherited human prion diseases | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Mark Zabel | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Early lymphoid system distribution of prions and employs vector systems expressing prion-targeted interfering RNA molecules as therapeutic strategies for prion infections | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Felix Duerr | Comparative Aging | Small animal musculoskeletal problems, including arthritis, sports injury treatment and prevention; canine-to-human translational applications | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Stephanie McGrath | Comparative Aging | Seizure and spinal cord disorders, inflammatory brain diseases; canine-to-human translational applications | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Nicole Ehrhart | Comparative Aging, Biology and Physiology of Aging | Translational aging, limb preservation, tissue engineering, and sarcoma research; bone and muscle regenerative medicine; canine-to-human translational applications | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| David Rojas-Rueda | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Environmental health; climate change; urban and transport planning; epidemiology; public health; community-based participatory research; environmental justice; health equity | Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Maria Delgado | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Aging in place; housing design | Design and Merchandising | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Lindsey Wilhelm | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Music therapy for care partners and aging adults with neurologic conditions | Music Therapy | College of Liberal Arts |
| James Graham | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Rehabilitation health services | Occupational Therapy | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Adela Chen | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Understanding the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) among individuals, including older adults, with emphasis on the impact of technology use in work and non-work domains | Computer Information Systems | College of Business |
| Ray Miller | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Economics of caregiving, population aging, the inequality of health and economic well-being among older populations; health policy | Economics | College of Liberal Arts |
| Harry Turtle | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Financial decisions of households represented in the Health and Retirement Study and the RAND American Life Panel | Finance and Real Estate | College of Business |
| Tianyang Wang | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Household financial planning strategies for managing longevity risk; behavior finance | Finance and Real Estate | College of Business |
| Katriana Popichak | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Neurodegenerative disease and neuroimmunology | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Elizabeth Ryan | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Food access, affordability, and availability; Brain fog, forgetfulness, and cognitive function concerns in long-COVID and cancer patients | Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Greg Ebel | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Virus infection; Nursing home surveillance; Arboviruses; Differential pathology/mortality in older adults | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Tawfik A Aboellail | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Neurodegenerative diseases: dementia, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Marcela Henao Tamayo | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Immune responses to vaccines and infectious diseases; how these responses vary with age and in relation to degenerative disorders and co-morbidities; maternal-fetal immune transfer | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Thomas Kuhn | Biology and Physiology of Aging | Cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying the decline of neuronal integrity and connectivity in aging individuals; natural-product drug development | Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Jennifer Currin-McCulloch | Cognitive, Social and Behavioral Aging | Psychosocial adaptions to serious illness and how people cope at end-of-life; caregiver experiences | Social Work | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Stephen Aichele | Cognitive, Social and Behavioral Aging | Cognitive epidemiology; Advanced longitudinal modeling and machine learning approaches to risk analysis (for cognitive decline, depression, mortality) in middle-aged and older adults; Cognitive testing for early diagnosis | Human Development and Family Studies | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Meara Faw | Cognitive, Social and Behavioral Aging | Positive communication and intervention strategies for caregivers; community-based experiences to promote healthy aging in people with cognitive impairments and their caregivers | Communication Studies | College of Liberal Arts |
| Kirk McGilvray | Comparative Aging | Deterioration and/or trauma to the skeletal system and soft tissues; development of advanced materials, techniques, and devices to monitor and aid in the treatment of these conditions | Mechanical Engineering | College of Engineering |
| Kelly Hall | Comparative Aging | Naturally occurring trauma in dogs as a model to identify markers of injury; therapeutic interventions to improve outcomes in geriatric trauma patients | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Brian Scansen | Comparative Aging | Partner site for the Dog Aging Project; cardiovascular health in animals | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Lisa Morgan | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Movement/dance and Parkinson's disease | Dance | College of Liberal Arts |
| Alan Schenkel | Biology & Physiology of Aging | Pulmonary fibrosis and non-tuberculosis mycobacterial infections in immunocompetent people | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Lubna Tahtamouni | Biology & Physiology of Aging | Pathogenesis of cofilin-actin rods in neurodegenerative diseases; Actin dynamics during migration of breast cancer cells | Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Jeffrey Wilusz | Biology & Physiology of Aging | RNA biology; influence of aging on the cell | Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Laurie Goodrich | Comparative Aging | Regenerative medicine; Effects of age on various biologic therapies | Clinical Sciences | College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences |
| Lise Aubry | Comparative Aging | Life history trade-offs and senescence in vertebrates | Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology | College of Natural Sciences |
| Tony Maciejewski | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Rehabilitation robotics to aid recovery from injuries; Social robotics for cognitive or emotional support | Electrical and Computer Engineering | College of Engineering |
| Elicia Ratajczyk | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Environmental social science; sustainable urban infrastructure; Lifelong Homes Initiative | Institute for the Built Environment | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Sara LoTemplio | Cognitive, Social and Behavioral Aging | How spending time outside in nature can influence human cognition and health | Human Dimensions of Natural Resources | Warner College of Natural Resources |
| Josiane Broussard | Biology and Physiology of Aging | The role of sleep and circadian physiology in metabolic homeostasis; Modifying behaviors (sleep, exercise and eating) to improve health | Health and Exercise Science | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Tianjian Zhou | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Applied statistics with a focus on clinical trials, cancer genomics, and infectious diseases | Statistics | College of Natural Sciences |
| Jain Kwon | Age-Friendly Engineering, Design and Rehabilitation | Neurodesign for physical and virtual environments; Gaze behaviors in wayfinding; Spatial perception and cognition in healthcare environments; Kinesthetic experience in multisensory settings | Design and Merchandising | College of Health and Human Sciences |
| Hollis Karoly | Cognitive, Social, and Behavioral Aging | Using behavioral measures, molecular biology methods, and neuroimaging techniques to understand the causes and consequences of substance use behavior, especially alcohol and cannabis use. | Psychology | College of Natural Sciences |
