New Tenure-Track Faculty, 2011-2012

David Brown, PhD
Assistant Professor of Mathematics

David Brown joins the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science in Fall 2011 from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where he was a Van Vleck Assistant Professor. He received his BS in Mathematics from the University of Arizona in 2003 and his PhD in mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley in 2010. His research focus is the study and classification of Galois representations, p-adic cohomology, algebraic stacks, and applications of these to problems in arithmetic. He has published a number of papers in these and related areas, and has taught Mathematics at Berkeley and Wisconsin, the latter including student advising in the NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates program.

David Jacho-Chávez, PhD
Assistant Professor of Economics

David Jacho-Chávez joins the Department of Economics in Fall 2011. He previously served as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at Indiana University. He received his BSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science, in 2000 and received both his MSc and PhD from the same institution in 2001 and 2006. David's main research area is in theoretical Econometrics/Statistics, specializing in nonparametric and semiparametric methods. His research has been published in top econometrics and statistical journals including, Econometric Reviews, Econometric Theory, Journal of Applied Econometrics, and Journal of Econometrics.

Roger B. Deal, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biology

Roger Deal joins the Department of Biology in January 2012. Dr. Deal earned a Ph.D. in Genetics from the University of Georgia in 2006 and a B.S. degree in Biology from the University of South Carolina in 1999. His research is focused on understanding how multicellular organisms build their bodies by drawing on stem cells to selectively produce each of the specialized cell types in the body. Roger was awarded a Ruth L. Kirschstein postdoctoral fellowship from the National Institutes of Health and has published his work in prestigious scientific journals including Science, Developmental Cell, Nature Protocols, and Plant Cell.

Marta Jimenez, PhD
Assistant Professor of Ancient Greek Philosophy and Moral Psychology

Marta Jimenez joins the Department of Philosophy in Fall 2011. She received her Licenciatura with honors (BA with honors) in philosophy and her DEA (MA) in philosophy from Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Spain). This past spring, she received her PhD in philosophy from the Collaborative Programme in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy at the University of Toronto (Canada). In both her teaching and her research, she is interested in the contemporary importance of ancient Greek philosophy, especially Aristotle, and work for issues in ethics, political theory, and understandings of human nature. She is currently developing her dissertation into a book entitled Virtues of Shame: The Positive Role of Shame in Aristotle's Account of Moral Development.

Sean Meighoo, PhD
Assistant Professor in Cultural Studies

Sean Meighoo joins the Graduate Institute of the Liberal Arts in Fall 2011. He received his BA, Summa Cum Laude in 1995, his MA in 1997, and his PhD in 2005 from York University (Toronto). His research and teaching interests focus on twentieth-century continental philosophy, literary theory, postcolonial studies, feminism, queer studies, and posthumanism. He is currently working on two book projects -- The End of the West, in which he seeks to demonstrate that the teleological concept of the West continues to guide even the most radical critiques of Western ethnocentrism; and The Philosophical Animal, where he considers the distinction between the human and the animal within various philosophical traditions.

Thomas Rogers, PhD
Assistant Professor of Modern Latin American History

Thomas Rogers joins the Department of History in Fall 2011. He received his PhD from Duke University in 2005 and his BA from Williams College in 1996. He explores the overlapping terrains of labor and environmental history in Brazil, particularly in the sugar and ethanol industries to open new perspectives on the relationships between society and the environment. His work also addresses racial dynamics and intellectual histories, including in the Caribbean. His first book, The Deepest Wounds: A Labor and Environmental History of Sugar in Northeast Brazil (University of North Carolina Press, 2010), won the Henry A. Wallace prize from the Agricultural History Society.

Christopher Scarborough, PhD
Assistant Professor of Chemistry

Christopher Scarborough joins the Department of Chemistry in Fall 2011 after completing postdoctoral work at the Max Planck Institute for Bioinorganic Chemistry, Germany. He earned his PhD from the University of Wisconsin (2008) and a BS from the University of California at Irvine (2003). His main research interest is the development of catalysts from abundant feedstocks that can drive chemical reactions of relevance to sustainable energy. Dr. Scarborough has contributed research publications across the traditional sub-disciplines of organic and inorganic chemistry, earning him numerous national awards from the American Chemical Society, Sigma-Aldrich, and an Alexander von Humboldt Post-doctoral Research Fellowship.

Ellie R. Schainker, PhD
Arthur Blank Family Foundation Assistant Professor of Modern European Jewish History

Ellie Schainker joins the Department of History and the Tam Institute for Jewish Studies in Fall 2011. She received her PhD from the Department of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on Imperial Russian Jewish history, and her dissertation, entitled "Imperial Hybrids: Russian-Jewish Converts in the Nineteenth Century," examines the phenomenon of religious conversion as an issue separate from the processes of assimilation, focusing on the persistence of social and religious ties between converts and Jews. Dr. Schainker's research interests also include religious reforms in Eastern Europe, the institutionalization of women's Jewish education in Europe, and the comparative study of Jewish-Christian relations in imperial Russia.

Venapally Suresh, PhD
Acting Professor of Mathematics

Venapally Suresh joins the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science in Fall 2011. He received an MSc in Mathematics from the University of Hyderabad, India, and a PhD in Mathematics from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, India. He joins Emory from the University of Hyderabad where he was professor and chair. He specializes in quadratic forms and division algebras, and arithmetic geometry. Dr. Suresh has published a number of pioneering articles on elliptic curves, p-adic curves, quadratic forms and division algebras. He is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, an invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians, and a recipient of numerous national awards in India.

Sergei Urazhdin, PhD
Assistant Professor of Physics

Sergei Urazhdin joins the Department of Physics in Fall 2011. He received his BS (1995) and MS (1997) from Rostov State University in Russia. Dr. Urazhdin comes to Emory from West Virginia University, having completed fellowships at Michigan State and Johns Hopkins University. He received his PhD from Michigan State University, in 2002. He is interested in developing novel materials and nanoscale structures, which can serve as the foundation for the future generation of sensors and electronic devices. His recent work has focused on electron spin physics in nanoscale materials and devices. He has published over 40 peer-reviewed articles in leading journals.

Emily Weinert, PhD
Assistant Professor of Chemistry

Emily Weinert joins the Department of Chemistry in Fall 2011. She earned her PhD from the University of Maryland in 2006 and received her BS in Chemistry from Duke University in 2002. Emily is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley where her work has focused on understanding ligand binding in heme proteins. As a teacher, she hopes to provide a fundamental understanding of chemical reactivity that students can apply to more complex systems, including biological molecules. Her research interests lie at the interface of chemistry and biology, with a particular interest in gaining a molecular level understanding of proteins and pathways involved in human disease.

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Alicia Ory DeNicola, PhD
Assistant Professor of Anthropology

Alicia Ory DeNicola joins Oxford College from University College, London, where she has been an honorary research associate since 2009. She holds a BA in communications from Lewis and Clark College, a MA in anthropology and women's studies from Brandeis University, and a PhD in anthropology from Syracuse University. Dr. DeNicola's research has included traditional cloth printing in north India and a study of logging and fishing communities in the Pacific Northwest. She is a frequent participant and speaker at professional organizations such as the American Anthropological Association, especially with regard to her work in Indian culture.

Matthew Moyle, PhD
Assistant Professor of French

Matthew Moyle joins Oxford College from the University of Memphis, where he was an instructor in French and director of the International House, a living-learning community for international students and students majoring in internationally-focused disciplines. He holds a BA in French and history from Bemidji State University and MA and PhD in French from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Moyle's doctoral research centered on novelist Sylvie Germain, and her work remains a focus of his research. Other research interests include the intersections of religion, ethics and literature in twentieth-century and contemporary French literature and the philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas.

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Emily C. Bianchi, PhD
Assistant Professor of Organization and Management

Emily Bianchi received her PhD in Management from Columbia University's Business School in 2011. She holds a MPhil in management from the Columbia Business School (2009) and a BA in psychology and Afro-American studies from Harvard University (2001). Her research interests include job attitudes, imprinting, organizational justice, and person perception. She has a recent publication entitled "Professed impressions: What people say about others affects onlookers' perceptions of speakers' power and warmth" in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology as well as a book chapter in press entitled "Able and willing: The importance of motive and competence attributions on trust repair."

Peter Thompson, PhD
Professor of Organization and Management

Peter Thompson holds a PhD in Agricultural Economics from the University of Florida (1993), a MS from the University of East Anglia, UK, and a BS from the University of Reading, UK. He has served on the faculty at Florida International University, Carnegie Mellon University, and the University of Houston. Dr. Thompson's research interests include macroeconomic theories of growth and technical change, the microeconomic foundations of economic growth, industry evolution, firm formation and entrepreneurship, and behavioral health economics. He has published in a diverse set of journals including Management Science, Journal of Political Economy, American Economic Review, and Rand Journal of Economics. He serves as an Associate Editor of Management Science and editorial board member of Journal of Evolutionary Economics.

James B. Wade, PhD
Asa Griggs Candler Chaired Professor of Organization and Management

James Wade holds a PhD in Business Administration (organizational behavior and industrial relations) from the University of California at Berkeley (1993), a MBA from the University of Texas, Austin in 1989, and a BS in mechanical engineering from Rice University (1982). He previously served on the faculty at Georgetown University, Rutgers University, University of Wisconsin, and the University of Illinois. Dr. Wade has two main areas of research: industry evolution and corporate governance. His research has been published in top journals such as Organization Science, Academy of Management Review, and Administrative Science Quarterly. He has been a senior editor of Organization Science and on the editorial boards of Administrative Science Quarterly, Strategic Management Journal, Organization Science.

Melissa J. Williams, PhD
Assistant Professor of Organization and Management

Melissa Williams holds a PhD in Social and Personality Psychology from the University of California at Berkeley in 2008 and a BA in Psychology and English from Rice University. She was previously a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University's School of Business. Her research focuses on the components of interpersonal interaction that operate outside of conscious awareness. In recent work Dr. Williams has been investigating the effects of interpersonal dominance and one's position in an organizational hierarchy on interpersonal behavior. Her research has been published in Personality and Social Psychology Review and Psychology of Women Quarterly.

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Francisco Alvarez, PhD
Associate Professor of Physiology

Francisco Alvarez received his PhD degree from Complutense University and Cajal Institute in Spain. His laboratory is interested in how neutral activity in the spinal cord changes during early development. He investigates the mechanisms that drive the postnatal maturation of spinal cord motor circuits, in particular the development of inhibitory synapses and interneurons that modulated the nerve cells that control spinal-cord medicated muscle activity. Dr. Alvarez's research has been published in The Journal of Neuroscience, Brain Research, the Journal of Neurophysiology, and The Journal of Physiology (London).

William Auffermann, MD/PhD
Assistant Professor of Radiology and Imaging Sciences

William Auffermann received his MD/PhD degree from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus in Minneapolis. His postgraduate medical training included a transitional residency at Hennepin County Medical Center, a radiology residency at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus in Minneapolis, and a cardiothoracic radiology fellowship at Duke University. Dr. Auffermann's clinical responsibility is in Department of Radiology's Division of Cardiothoracic Imaging at Emory University Hospital. His most recent research focused on the magnetic resonance imaging of the lungs using hyperpolarized xenon. His work has been published in journals such as Imaging in Medicine, NeuroImage, and Magnetic Resonance Imaging.

Cathrin Buetefisch, MD, PhD
Associate Professor of Neurology

Cathrin Buetefisch received her medical degree from Free University of Berlin and her PhD from Heinrich-Heine University, both in Germany. Her postgraduate medical training included a residency in neurological rehabilitation at Free University of Berlin and a research fellowship at Heinrich-Heine University, both in Germany. She also did an NIH fellowship and a residency in neurology at West Virginia University. Dr. Buetefisch research focuses on stroke, rehabilitation and deep brain stimulators. Her work has been published in journals such as Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair and Brain Stimulation.

Paul García, MD/PhD
Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology

Paul García received his medical degree from Emory University School of Medicine in 2006. He is currently completing his residency at Emory University School of Medicine. Dr. Garcia will spend his professional effort at Emory University Hospital and the Veteran's Memorial Hospital. His research focuses on the focuses on the pharmacologic manipulation of mammalian brain circuits which use the most abundant inhibitory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system, gamma-aminobutyric acid, GABA as their chief signaling molecule. Dr. Garcia's work has been published in Journal of Neurophysiology, Anesthesiology, and Current Neuropharmacology.

Shannon L. Gourley, PhD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

Shannon Gourley earned a PhD in Neurosciences from Yale University and a BS degree from Tufts University. Dr. Gourley's research interests revolve around the way the shape and inter-connectedness of the 100 billion neurons comprising the brain determine mood regulation and flexible behavior. By studying pathological stimuli such as drugs of abuse and stress exposure, Dr. Gourley aims to understand how the simplification of neuronal structure results in cognitive impairment and behavioral rigidity. Dr. Gourley has authored several peer-reviewed manuscripts including those published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Biological Psychiatry.

Warren R. Jones, PhD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

Warren Jones received his PhD in Neuroscience from Yale School of Medicine. He has unique skills in infant, toddler, and school-age eye-tracking research, which are unmatched in the world, covering all aspects of this research inclusive of technology, execution, research design, and data analytic strategies. Dr. Jones is a published author with contributions in several peerreviewed manuscripts to include: Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Brain & Cognition to name a few. He is also a lecturer and presenter both nationally and internationally.

Saul J. Karpen, MD, PhD
Acting Professor of Pediatric

Saul Karpen received his undergraduate degree in Biomechanical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 1982 and his MD/PhD degree (PhD in Biochemistry) from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in 1989. His postgraduate medical training included a Pediatrics Residency and a Pediatric GI/Hepatology Fellowship from Yale. Dr. Karpen will serve as Division Chief of Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition. His research has been published in journals such as Hepatology, Journal of Hepatology, and Seminars in Liver Disease.

Wilbur Lam, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

Wilbur Lam received his medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine in 1999 and his PhD degree from the joint Bioengineering program at University California, San Francisco and University of California, Berkley in 2008. Dr. Lam's current research focuses on the quantitative investigation of the cellular interactions in sickle cell disease to determine their relative contributions to vaso-occlusion, hemolysis, and reactive oxygen species generation. His work has been published in Molecular Cancer, Nature Materials, British Journal of Haematology, and Blood.

Tracey Lamb, PhD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

Tracey Lamb received her PhD degree from the University of Edinburgh in 2004. She was a lecturer in immunology of infectious diseases at the School of Biological Sciences, University of Reading in the United Kingdom. Dr. Lamb's research focuses on understanding the immunology of malaria infections with a view to rational malaria vaccine development. In particular, the Lamb lab is interested in defining how different populations of CD4+ T helper cells arise in malaria infection. Her work on malarial research has been published in Future Microbiology, Malarial Journal, Experimental Parasitology, and Immunity.

Anice C. Lowen, PhD
Assistant Professor of Microbiology and Immunology

Anice Lowen obtained her PhD degree in Virology from the University of Glasgow, Scotland. Her training focused on the characterization of untranslated regions of the Bunyamwera Virus Genome using reverse genetics. Dr. Lowen's current work now focuses on the development of novel influenza vaccine strategies and the transmission of influenza viruses with particular emphasis on the swine-origin influenza virus that recently emerged in humans. Her research has been published in the Journal of Virology, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Virology.

James Gordon Ramsay, PhD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

James Ramsay is a graduate of University of Southampton in England; University of Waterloo, in Canada; École Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications in Paris, and Cambridge University in England. He will be working as part of the new autism initiative and is working towards establishing a new state-of-the-art infant speech laboratory. Dr. Ramsay specializes in analysis, synthesis and recognition of speech using computational models of speech production and perception. He has expertise in digital signal processing and statistical estimation techniques. Dr. Ramsay's work has been published in the Journal of the Acoustical; he has given several presentations in the Speech Production seminars and Spoken Language Processing conferences.

Nicholas Seyfried, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biochemistry

Nicholas Seyfried received his BS in Biochemistry from Boston College and his PhD degree in Biochemistry from the University of Oxford, United Kingdom. He completed his postdoctoral research at Emory with Dr. Jumin Peng. Dr. Seyfried's research focuses on structural biology, protein chemistry, proteomics, and protein engineering. He has been published in such peer-reviewed journals such as Analytical Chemistry, Molecular & Cellular Proteomics, and Cancer Letters.

Thomas Wingo, MD
Assistant Professor of Neurology

Thomas Wingo completed his medical degree in Neurology at Emory University Medical School in 2004. His postgraduate medical training included a residency and fellowships in cognitive and behavioral science (2009) and translational neurology (2010) also at Emory. Dr. Wingo's primary research focus is the genetic basis for Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases that affect cognition. His articles have been published in some of the leading journals including Journal of Clinical Psychology, Neuropharmacology, and Neurobiology. Dr. Wingo is also a faculty member at the Veteran's Administration Medical Center since June of 2010.

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Deborah Watkins Bruner, RN, PhD, FAAN
Robert W. Woodruff Professor of Nursing

Deborah Watkins Bruner joins the Nursing faculty in September 2011. She completed her doctoral degree in nursing research, with a focus on outcomes research in 1999 from the University of Pennsylvania, a Master's in Nursing Oncology in 1985, a Master's in Nursing Administration in 1988, both from Widener University, and her Bachelor's in Nursing in 1978, from West Chester University. Dr. Bruner's research has focused on quality of life, patient reported outcomes, and symptom management across cancer sites, as well as decision-making, preferences and utilities for cancer therapies. She has been published in a number of journals including the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Journal of the National Cancer Institute, and the International Journal of Radiation Oncology, Biology, Physics.

Drenna Waldrop-Valverde, PhD
Associate Professor of Nursing

Drenna Waldrop-Valverde joins the Nursing faculty in September 2011. She received her PhD in Counseling Psychology in 1999 from the University of Memphis; a Master's in Counseling Psychology in 1995, from the University of Southern Mississippi; and a Bachelor's in Psychology in 1993, from the University of Alabama. Her postdoctoral fellowship was completed at the University of Miami in 2000. Her research focuses on HIV associated neurocognitive disorders and their effect on self-management abilities, particularly medication adherence and engagement in care. She also studies health literacy, cognitive rehabilitation, and health disparities. Dr. Waldrop-Valverde's findings have been published in a number of journals including the American Journal of Infectious Diseases and Journal of AIDS.

Faye S. Routledge, PhD, RN
Assistant Professor of Nursing

Faye S. Routledge joins the Nursing faculty in September 2011. She earned her PhD in Nursing from Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, CA in 2010; she also received a Master of Nursing from the same institution in 2006. Her research has focused on identifying factors that are associated with elevated night-time blood pressure among individuals with high blood pressure and hypertension. Other research interests include exploring differences in endothelial function and cardiovascular health between women and men. Dr. Routledge's work has been published in a number of journals including the American Journal of Hypertension, the International Journal of Nursing Studies, the Journal of Cardiac Failure, the European Journal of Cardiovascular Nursing, and the Canadian Journal of Cardiology.

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Michael Caudle, PhD
Assistant Professor of Environmental Health

Michael Caudle joined the Emory faculty in September 2010. He received a PhD (Neuroscience) from Emory University in 2007 and a BS from Colorado State University in 1998. Prior to joining the Emory faculty, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Washington, where he studied the unique susceptibility of the central nervous system to environmental toxicants. His work integrates the fields of neurotoxicology and proteomics. He has authored abstracts and articles in journals such as the Journal of Immunology, Neurotoxicology, and Journal of Neuroscience.

Howard Chang, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Howard Chang joins RSPH in August 2011, having served as a Postdoctoral Associate and Fellow at North Carolina State and Duke Universities. He received a PhD (Biostatistics) in 2009 from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health following a BSc in 2004 from the University of British Columbia (Canada). His research involves the application of statistical methods to studying the health consequences of toxic environmental exposures. He is the author of 10 published articles in such journals as the American Journal of Epidemiology, Environmental and Ecological Statistics and the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

Lyndsey Darrow, PhD
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology

Lyndsey Darrow was appointed to a tenure track position in January 2011. She had previously been Research Assistant Professor of Environmental Health at RSPH. She received a PhD (Epidemiology) from Emory University in 2008 and a BA from Stanford University in 2000. Her research interests include health consequences of exposure to air pollution and reproductive and children's environmental health. Her 17 publications appear in leading epidemiology and environmental journals including Epidemiology, American Journal of Epidemiology and Environmental Health Perspectives. In 2007, she received a Teacher-Scholar Award from the Hughes Medical Institute and Emory University.

Jason Hockenberry, PhD
Assistant Professor of Health Policy and Management

Jason Hockenberry begins his appointment in August 2011, after serving as Assistant Professor in the College of Public Health of the University of Iowa since 2008. He received a PhD (Economics) from Lehigh University in 2008 and a BS from Kutztown University in 2002. He studies financial factors affecting the utilization of health services and the economic impact of tobacco use and related health problems. He is the author of 6 published articles in journals such as Journal of Human Capital, Health Services Research and Journal of Health Economics. He is currently the principal investigator of study of the impact of surgeon human capital depreciation on resource use and patient outcomes supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Yijuan Hu, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Yijuan Hu joins the RSPH faculty in August 2011. She completed a PhD (Biostatistics) in 2010 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and in 2005, received BS degrees in Applied Mathematics and in Economics from Peking University (China). Her research interests include statistical genetics and bioinformatics. She is the author of 6 papers in journals such as Genetic Epidemiology, Biostatistics and the American Journal of Human Genetics. In 2010, she received the Distinguished Student Paper Award from the Eastern North American Region International Biometric Society.

Jian Kang, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Jian Kang begins an appointment at RSPH in August 2011. He received a PhD (Biostatistics) from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 2011, MSc (Mathematics) from Tsinghua University (China) in 2007 and a BSc from Beijing Normal University (China) in 2005. His research interests include Bayesian methods, statistical image analysis and spatial statistics. He is the author of five published articles in periodicals such as the Journal of the American Statistical Association, Statistics in Medicine and Human Mutation.

Jeanne Kowalski, PhD
Associate Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Jeanne Kowalski began her Emory faculty appointment in October 2010, also serving as the Director of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, a shared resource for the Winship Cancer Institute. She received a PhD (Statistics) from the University of Pittsburgh in 1998. She received an MA (Statistics) from Pittsburgh in 1996 and BA from Chatham College in 1990. She applies biostatistics methods to cancer-related research and incorporates genomic analyses into her research. Her work on cancer research has been published in such journals as Clinical Cancer Research, International Journal of Cancer, Nature and Bioinformatics. She is an active contributor of numerous book chapters and serves on the editorial boards of a number of professional journals.

Michael Kramer, PhD
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology

Michael Kramer began his appointment as a tenure-track faculty member in April 2011, following an appointment as Research Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at RSPH since 2009. He received a PhD (Epidemiology) from Emory in 2009, an MS (Emergency Medicine) from Alderson-Broaddus College in 2004, MMSc.(Physician Assistant) from Emory in 1997, and BA from Earlham College in 1991. His research interests include social epidemiology; maternal and child health; spatial epidemiologic methods; and the impact of racial residential segregation on health and health care. He is the author of 15 articles appearing in journals such as American Journal of Epidemiology, Public Health Reports, and Social Science and Medicine.

Neil K. Mehta, PhD
Assistant Professor of Global Health

Neil Mehta joins the RSPH faculty in August 2011. He received a PhD (Demography) from the University of Pennsylvania in 2009, and an MA (Demography) in 2005. He earned an MSc (Development Studies) from the London School of Economics and Political Science (UK) in 2001 and a BA from Oberlin College in 1997. He is currently a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health and Society Scholar at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. His research interests are in obesity, immigrant health and health behaviors more generally. He is the author of 7 articles in journals such as Demography, American Journal of Preventive Medicine and Social Forces.

Jennifer G. Mulle, MHS, PhD
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology

Jennifer Mulle begins her appointment at the School of Public Health in October 2011; she is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow in Human Genetics at Emory University School of Medicine. She received a PhD (Human Genetics) from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 2005 and an MS in Genetic Epidemiology in 2000. She received a BA from the Johns Hopkins University in 1993. She has been investigating the role of genomic copy number variation in risk for schizophrenia with support from NIMH and NARSAD. She is the author of 18 articles appearing in journals such as the American Journal of Human Genetics, Human Molecular Genetics, Human Mutations and Molecular Psychiatry.

Zhaohui (Steve) Qin, PhD
Associate Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Steve Qin began his appointment at RSPH in August 2010. He received a PhD (Statistics) from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 2000 and, following a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University, returned to Michigan as Assistant Professor of Biostatistics in 2003. He received a BS at Peking University (China) in 1994. His research interests include statistical methods and applications to genomics and genetics. He is the author of over 45 peerreviewed papers including those in journals such as Science, Bioinformatics, Nature and American Journal of Human Genetics.

Yan Sun, PhD
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology

Yan Sun joined the RSPH faculty in June 2011; he previously served as Assistant Research Scientist at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. He received a PhD (Biochemistry and Molecular Biology) from Wayne State University in 2001 where he also received an MS (Computer Science) in 2003; he received a BS degree from Peking University (China) in 1996. He studies the genetic origins of chronic conditions with a particular interest in ethnic health disparities. He is the author of 23 publications in journals such as Human Genetics, Genetic Epidemiology, Journal of Hypertension and Bioinformatics.

Hao Wu, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics

Hao Wu began his faculty appointment at RSPH in July 2010. He received a PhD (Biostatistics) and MHS (Bioinformatics) from the Johns Hopkins University in 2010, an MS (Electrical Engineering) from Iowa State University in 2000 and BS from Tsinghua University (China) in 1996. His research has mainly focused on bioinformatics and computational biology. He is particularly interested in developing statistical methods and computational tools for interpreting large-scale genomic data from high-throughput technologies such as microarrays and second generation sequencing. He authored and coauthored 12 papers and book chapters including articles in Nature Method, Nature Genetics, Bioinformatics and Genome Research.

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Jennifer Ryan Ayres, PhD
Assistant Professor of Religious Education

Jennifer Ayres received her PhD in the Graduate Division of Religion at Emory University, her MDiv at Union Theological Seminary-Presbyterian School of Christian Education, and her BA degree at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Ayres research interests include: issues of moral formation in environmental ethics, religious political activism, and religion and popular culture. Ayres is currently completing work on a book entitled Waiting for a Glacier to Move: Practicing Social Witness (Wipf and Stock). Jennifer Ayres is an ordained minister of word and sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (USA).

Anthony A. Briggman, PhD
Assistant Professor of the History of Early Christianity

Anthony Briggman received his PhD degree at Marquette University, his MDiv degree at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and his BA at Cedarville University. Briggman's research interests focus on binitarian and early Trinitarian theology in the Apologists, especially Irenaeus of Lyons and Justin Martyr, with special attention to the influence of contemporaneous Jewish thought on their theologies. Briggman's book entitled The Theology of the Holy Spirit according to Irenaeus of Lyons is now in press (Oxford University Press).

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