Research Team

My research has a specialized focus on evaluating the behavioral, pharmacological and toxicological effects of cigarette and non-cigarette tobacco products, such as electronic cigarettes and hookah. I also have expertise developing and testing motivational, enhancement-based smoking cessation and secondhand smoke reduction interventions for children of parents who smoke.

As an attorney and member of the Cancer Control Program at the OSUCCC – James, I focus on the intersection of public health and law. My research examines how public health research can assist in tobacco regulatory policy and explores how legal doctrines facilitate or limit public health interventions, particularly those relating to cancer prevention.

As a member of the Center for Tobacco Research and the Cancer Control Program at the OSUCCC – James, I focus my research on important questions related to obesity, respiratory function and exercise physiology. My research also involves testing novel interventions that can reduce respiratory symptoms and improve exercise tolerance in patients with obesity.

Although recent projects include endometrial cancer, my interests are broad and include the study of many solid tumors, including cancers of the breast, prostate and lung, among others. Additionally, I am interested in tobacco control research, focusing on the health effects of electronic cigarette use among cancer patients.

My cancer-relevant research interests include how tobacco product design, including chemical additives, affect human cancer risk associated from using these products. I use non-invasive techniques such as puffing behavior, exhaled breath analysis and imaging of specific chemicals, particles and aerosols to estimate human exposures to carcinogens.

I serve as co-leader of the Molecular Carcinogenesis and Chemoprevention Program at the OSUCCC – James, where my research is dedicated to prostate cancer prevention and therapy, as well as projects focusing on diet, nutrition and lifestyle for cancer prevention and survivorship.

I am an Organic/Analytical chemist tha­t went from fundamental organometallic chemistry research to being interested in the assessment of human exposure to toxicants from various sources, especially tobacco products.

My research falls into the following areas within the field of tobacco control: smoking cessation, tobacco use surveillance, tobacco policy, and tobacco regulatory science. With respect to smoking cessation, my independent research is largely focused on smokers who can be reached through healthcare providers and the healthcare system. In the past, I have led projects that target Medicaid-enrolled smokers in Southeast Ohio and smokers with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders. My current work includes co-directing a smoking cessation project within NCI-funded P01. The intervention involves an ask-advise-refer model delivered to female smokers in Appalachian primary care clinics. My surveillance work includes secondary analyses of population-based data from the US, China, and Italy. My research in the area of tobacco control policy has involved work with clean indoor air ordinances and tobacco advertising. Finally, my current work in tobacco regulatory science includes an NCI-funded R01 (with Marielle Brinkman) that is focused on examining the impact of waterpipe warning labels.

I am an epidemiologist and assistant professor in the Division of Medical Oncology at The Ohio State University. As a member of the Cancer Control Program at the OSUCCC – James, I am interested in tobacco regulatory science, particularly regulations related to marketing and product characteristics. My current research program focuses on identifying key characteristics of tobacco products that drive their addiction potential. I am also interested in tobacco regulations to promote health equity, especially for Appalachian populations.

As a behavioral epidemiologist, I’m interested in cancer prevention through the use of policy, systems and environmental change strategies to reduce or prevent tobacco use. I’ve been involved and led projects within priority populations of youth, young adults, as well as rural adults at high risk for tobacco use. As a co-Investigator within Ohio State's Center of Excellent of Regulatory Tobacco Science, I examined the impacts of imagery within health warning labels, and developed experiments on features of health warnings to understand their impacts on risk perceptions, recall, and behavioral intentions to use tobacco. These studies have primarily focused on cigarettes, but my research interests include the diversity of tobacco products, including cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, e-cigarettes and waterpipe tobacco.

I am associate professor of Medical Oncology and Assistant Dean for Research and Tenure Track Faculty at the Ohio State University College of Medicine, and Director of Training in the Center for Tobacco Research at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – James Cancer Hospital.

I am the vice dean for research in the Ohio State College of Medicine and director of the Dorothy M. Davis Heart and Lung Research Institute. I have been with The Ohio State University since 2011. My research is focused on uncovering the mechanisms underlying abnormal heart rhythms and heart failure in children and young adults with the goals of designing new therapies for diseases at the level of the individual as well as population. I have more than 210 peer-reviewed publications including manuscripts in Nature, Cell, Journal of Clinical Investigation, Circulation, Nature Medicine, PNAS and Science Signaling.

My work focuses on building and optimizing cessation interventions for highly vulnerable populations (e.g. homeless youth and domestic violence survivors) recognizing the chaotic circumstances in which they live and are trying to recover, heal and make behavioral change. As the leading cause of premature morbidity and mortality, and due to its high prevalence within these populations, I have increasingly focused my scholarship on understanding smoking behavior and cessation.

My current research program focuses on identifying key characteristics of marketing and health communications that influence consumer's risk perceptions and use of nicotine and tobacco.

My research focuses on tobacco use among adolescents and young adults and other populations that have been historically targeted by the tobacco industry (e.g., racial/ethnic minorities, individuals living in rural areas). The ultimate aim is to better understand the factors that contribute to tobacco initiation and tobacco-related disparities, as well as how such factors can be targeted for prevention. As a social scientist, my work considers factors at many levels of analysis, ranging from the individual level to the policy level. Much of my research focuses on tobacco regulatory science to inform local, state, and federal policy, such as investigations into retailer licensing and Tobacco 21. My research methods include longitudinal surveys, ecological momentary assessment (EMA), focus groups, and community mapping.

My research focuses on the economic analysis of health behaviors, with an emphasis on how taxes and policies impact substance use and abuse.

I am a medical oncologist with a focus on the treatment of lung cancer. My research interests are in prevention, with a focus on lung cancer and breast cancer. I study the causes of cancer and develops biomarkers of cancer risk in order to develop more rational prevention methods and improve early detection of cancer.

My research interests focus on multi-omics studies to integrate environmental/lifestyle factors, epigenetics, genetics and biomarkers of exposure to understand how differences among genes and environments aid to identify biomarkers of effects and ultimately control and prevent disease. Current research includes tobacco use, diet, obesity and various cancers, including hepatocellular carcinoma, lung, breast and colorectal cancers.

I am a pediatric psychologist and assistant professor in the Division of Medical Oncology at The Ohio State University.

I received my B.A. in Psychology from McGill University and my Ph.D. in Psychology from Dartmouth College. My research involves understanding the role of motivation, self-control and desire in precipitating self-regulation failures. Using a combination of eye-tracking, functional neuroimaging and measures of structural and functional brain connectivity, this work examines how individual differences in the ability to regulate desire for appetitive stimuli (food, cigarettes, alcohol) can be used to predict real-world self-control failures.

I am a member of the Molecular Carcinogenesis and Chemoprevention Program at the OSUCCC – James, where my research focuses on host defense against pathogens. In particular, I seek to understand how the lung and circulating mononuclear phagocytes sense danger from pathogens and respond with robust inflammation around IL-1.

My area of research is focused on external triggers of cardiovascular disease, with special emphasis on the role of cancer cachexia and air pollution. Both projects are NIH R01 funded and investigate how the cardiovascular system is affected by these stressors. State-of-the art in vivo and in vitro technologies are utilized to investigate how the heart responds to these stressors, and attempts are made to treat with novel pharmacological agents.

My research focuses on FDA law and policy. Cancer-relevant areas of interest include: (1) The intersection of state/local and FDA regulation; (2) First Amendment constraints on government regulation of tobacco and drug industry speech; (3) Ethical and legal questions regarding cancer patients’ non-trial pre-approval access to investigational medicines (a.k.a., “compassionate use,” “expanded access,” and/or “right to try”); and (4) Questions regarding the scope of FDA jurisdiction (e.g., what things can FDA regulate, what things are properly considered drugs vs. tobacco products).