SPHHS Students Named 2023 CRF Student Research Award Recipients
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The Center for Research on Families (CRF) at UMass Amherst has selected four SPHHS doctoral candidates and one undergraduate student working in an SPHHS lab among its 2023 student research awards recipients.
Environmental Health Sciences doctoral candidate Joshua Mogus received a $5000 Dissertation Award. This award is given to PhD students who have demonstrated superior potential in any area of family research. Shivangi Bajpai, doctoral candidate in Kinesiology, and Elizabeth Delorme, doctoral candidate in the Community Health Education program, were selected as Methodology Workshop Scholarship recipients. Kinesiology doctoral candidate Lingsong Kong received a $350 Travel Scholarship in support of presenting original family research at a national conference. Finally, Charlotte Gridley, an undergraduate Environmental Science major working in the lab of Professor Alicia Timme-Laragy, received an undergraduate Research Award. This $2,000 award is given to rising junior or senior undergraduate students who have demonstrated superior potential in any area of family research and seek further mentoring in this area.
The SPHHS-affiliated CRF student award recipients are:
Joshua Mogus (Dissertation Award) is a PhD candidate in Environmental Health Sciences. Under the mentorship of Professor Laura Vandenberg, his current research is focused on identifying the effects that chemical contaminants have on pregnant and nursing mothers. Under the guidance of hormones, a mother’s mammary gland undergoes incredible change during pregnancy and lactation. These changes allow her to provide adequate milk to nourish her babies but some of these changes lead to long-term reduction in mom’s lifetime risk breast cancer. Using the mouse as a study model, Joshua’s dissertation seeks to answer if the mammary gland during pregnancy, lactation, or both is vulnerable to chemical exposure and how these chemicals affect mom’s ability to provide milk or alter her long-term protection from mammary gland cancers.
Shivangi Bajpai (Methodology Workshop Scholarship) is a PhD candidate in Kinesiology. Under the mentorship of Assistant Professor Amanda Paluch, Bajpai’s current research work includes advancing measurement of physical activity and studying the association of physical activity with various health outcomes. She is passionate about improving health outcomes among older adults and informal family caregivers of Alzheimer’s and related dementia (ADRD). Her dissertation work will focus on exploring the utility of wearable device metrics in monitoring psychological and cardiovascular health of ADRD caregivers.
Elizabeth Delorme (Methodology Workshop Scholarship) is a PhD candidate in the Community Health Education program. Under the mentorship of Professors Liz Evans and Aline Gubrium, her current research is focused on resilience and stress among transitional-aged, pregnant and parenting women with substance use disorder who are seeking or are in recovery. Delorme is interested in how to better support young women in recovery facing social and systematic barriers to improve their own well-being and that of their children. Her dissertation will center the experiences and voices of this vulnerable population to highlight gaps in care and services and discover potential pathways for better resource allocation and treatment options. In the future, Delorme hopes to explore the impact of emotional regulation skill development for these young mothers and to examine if those skills are passed down to their young children, further cultivating resilience not only for themselves but also their children.
Lingsong Kong (Travel Scholarship) is a PhD candidate in Kinesiology. He is studying physical activity epidemiology under the mentorship of Assistant Professor Amanda Paluch in the EpiTech Activity Lab. Prior to getting into UMass, Lingsong earned his master’s degree in Exercise Science from Southern Connecticut State University. His current research focuses on examining the association between accelerometer-measured physical activity patterns and health outcomes, such as frailty, cardiovascular diseases, and obesity, in multiple populations including older adults and postpartum women. His career goal is to become a physical activity epidemiologist and use his knowledge and research findings to improve public health by promoting physical activity participation.
Charlotte Gridley (Undergraduate Research Award) is an Environmental Science major, part of the Commonwealth Honors College, and a member of Professor Alicia Timme-Laragy’s lab in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences. She is interested in the impact of environmental contaminants on human health, specifically with exposure in utero and early in development. Her honors thesis research examines the impact of developmental PFOS exposure using zebrafish as a model for human health. The exocrine pancreas, essential for the production of digestive enzymes to break down food, has been shown to be impacted by PFOS exposure. Her work looks at how lipid uptake, lipid metabolism, and digestive enzyme activity are impacted by PFOS exposure early in development and how this can then be related back to humans. Her honors thesis is titled, “Optimization of Lipid Uptake and Protease Activity Assays with Developmental PFOS Exposure using Zebrafish (Danio rerio).”