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key partnerships
Brown University's Center for Environmental Health and Technology (CEHT)
http://med.brown.edu/ceht/
The establishment of the Center for Environmental Health (CEHT), approved by the Brown University Corporation in Spring 2007, provides Brown’s SRP with an identity and an organizational structure that can properly accommodate its activities and growth. The CEHT is now the intellectual and administrative home for the Brown SRP. Dr. Karl Kelsey, formerly of the Harvard School of Public Health and a leader in the field of molecular epidemiology, began as Director of CEHT in September, 2007. Dr. Kelsey is co-leader of Project 8, and holds joint faculty appointments in the Division of Epidemiology within the Program in Public Health and in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine within the Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown. Dr. Kelsey has articulated a vision for the CEHT that builds on the existing interdisciplinary activities of the SRP.
The Rhode Island Birth Cohort and the National Children's Study (NCS)
http://www.nationalchildrensstudy.gov/
The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development awarded Brown University and lead partner Women and Infants Hospital of Rhode Island a five-year, multi-million dollar contract as a National Children’s Study site. In concert with this federally funded effort, a team of faculty from the Program in Public Health, and Women and Infants Hospital have initiated an independent, new prenatal cohort study at Women & Infants Hospital focused upon investigation of the impacts of a wide variety of exposures on the health outcomes of children.
The Rhode Island Birth Cohort and the allied National Children’s Study (NCS) are key to Project 8, “Environment, Genetics and Epigenetics in a R.I. Birth Cohort.”
Dr. Carmen Marsit, with guidance from Dr. Kelsey, will begin to relate mixed exposures to adverse pregnancy outcomes in the Rhode Island population, and to identify as novel biomarkers, epigenetic alterations in newborns associated with in utero exposures.
The Institute for Molecular and Nanoscale Innovation (IMNI)
http://www.brown.edu/Departments/IMNI
The close ties between SRP and IMNI arise, in part, from the ongoing research collaboration between Dr. Robert Hurt, Leader of Project 6, and Dr. Agnes Kane, Leader of Project 2. Newly established, IMNI is being organized as the cross-disciplinary umbrella to coordinate nanoscale activities at Brown, expanding on a strong tradition of basic physical sciences and materials science. As research and development has moved to the nanometer (one billionth of a meter) length scale, nanotechnology incorporates biology, chemistry, physics and engineering into an interdisciplinary research and development venture. Together with anticipated future faculty hires, and an emerging partnership with Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, Brown is expected to become one of the most exciting centers for materials and nanoscale research in the nation. A new joint seminar series has already been established, and new graduate courses and an expanded graduate program in this area will follow, providing the catalyst for the regular intellectual exchange that bring parties together and attracts new members into this area of research. Cross-fertilization between the SRP and IMNI is expected to continue as these activities grow and mature.
Women and Infants Hospital
http://www.womenandinfants.org
As a participant in the National Children’s Study, our SRP will partner with Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island and others to enroll 1,000 Providence County children in the study and follow them from before birth until age 21 to examine the effects of environmental influences on their health and well-being.
State of Rhode Island:
Department of Environmental Management
http://www.dem.ri.gov
Department of Health
http://www.health.state.ri.us/
Our Research Translation Core Core B, has fostered and strengthened our partnerships with RIDEM and RIDOH. Through these partnerships, we have collaborated with individuals and organizations throughout the greater Northeast, and have become informed about emerging and existing environmental challenges in Rhode Island and beyond. Training workshops with broad participation by professionals and regulators have been designed to provide information about how to successfully manage these environmental challenges.