About Us

The Gateway Exposome Coordinating Center (GECC) advances research on the various environmental exposures over the life course — known as the “exposome” — that affect Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) and AD-Related Dementias (ADRD) risk, resilience, and disparities. Currently, accessing and sharing exposome data among government agencies, researchers, advocacy groups, and businesses is challenging. The GECC aims to address these issues by facilitating collaboration and consensus-building across disciplines, and serving as a hub for collecting, organizing, and sharing exposome data for AD/ADRD research. We concentrate on six main domains: extreme weather, physical environment, social environment, policy environment, community services environment, and life experiences. By creating a collaborative platform across these focuses, we help improve knowledge and understanding of AD/ADRD, which can drive policy changes and provide better data for future research. The GECC is funded by the National Institute on Aging. Our interdisciplinary team is based at the Center for Economic and Social Research, the University of Southern California and the University of Michigan.

Our Team
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS

Jinkook Lee

University of Southern California

Sara Adar

University of Michigan School of Public Health

David Knapp

University of Southern California

ADVISORS

Kathleen Cagney

University of Michigan

Bryan Hubbell

Former EPA National Program Director

Sean Morrison

Mount Sinai New York

Jennifer Manly

Columbia University

Bhramar Mukherjee

Yale University

William Dow

University of California Berkeley

OPERATIONS

Maya Fransz-Myers

University of Southern California

Center Coordinator

McKayla Wenner

University of Southern California

Policy and Community Services Environment Domain Coordinator

Eden Wetzel

University of Southern California

Life Experiences Domain and Methods Domain Coordinator

Tom Luben

University of Michigan

Extreme Weather, Physical, and Social Environment Domain Coordinator

DOMAIN LEADS

Gregory Wellenius

Boston University

Extreme Weather Domain Lead

Michael Brauer

University of British Columbia

Physical Environment Domain Co-Lead

Margaret Hicken

University of Michigan

Social Environment Domain Co-Lead

HwaJung Choi

University of Michigan

Community Services Domain Co-Lead

David Van Riper

University of Minnesota

Community Services Domain Co-Lead

Sarah Flood

University of Minnesota

Life Experiences Domain Lead

Shrikanth Narayanan

University of Southern California

Industry Liaison

Emma Nichols

University of Southern California

Methods Lead

Bas Weerman

University of Southern California

IT Director

Lorna Thorpe

NYU Grossman School of Medicine

Dissemination Co-Lead

Jeffrey Brook

University of Toronto

Physical Environment Domain Co-Lead

Kevin Lane

Boston University

Extreme Weather Domain Co-Lead

COLLABORATORS

Kayleigh Keller

Colorado State University

Erik Meijer

University of Southern California

Birgit G. Claus Henn

Boston University

Yao-Yi Chiang

University of Minnesota

Lucy Hutyra

Boston University

Emma Gause

Boston University

Chad Milando

Boston University

Kevin Lane

Boston University

Dany Doiron

University of Montreal

Clémence Kieny

University of Lausanne

Ben Spoer

NYU Grossman School of Medicine

Mauricio Avendano

University of Lausanne

Allison James

Boston University

Research Fellow

Talia Feldscher

Boston University

Research Fellow

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The GECC is funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) U24AG088894.