The major research focus in the Division of Epidemiology is on the health of infant, children, and women, with particular emphasis on the roles of environmental and genetic factors in infant and childhood growth and neurodevelopment, pubertal development, and the etiology and determinants of cancer. Under Mount Sinai's Center for Children's Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research, a five-year study has been conducted on the effects of exposures to indoor pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) on infant and childhood growth and neurodevelopment in a racially and ethnically diverse urban cohort of mothers and children. This project has recently been renewed for an additional five years to assess the longer-term impact of these toxicants as well as some of the newly emerging endocrine disruptors. A second pregnancy cohort is evaluating the impact of the toxic pollutants released from the World Trade Center (WTC) fire and collapse on 9/11 and associated psychological stress, including post traumatic stress disorder, on the health of pregnant women and their infants. Both cohort studies involve analyses of genetic polymorphisms related to the toxicants.

Another major focus is on the studies examining the joint roles of genetic and environmental factors in the etiology of cancer.. In particular, current genes under study include high and low penetrant genes involved in DNA damage and repair pathways. . One example of our on-going population-based research is the WECARE Study, a a 20-center population-based study of radiation exposure, genetic susceptibility and breast cancer. Other projects include the assessment of energy balance (diet, physical activity and body size) in relation to cancer risk; the efficacy of a new biomarker, mammaglobin, in the early detection, prognosis, and/or response to therapy of breast cancer patients; and a methodologic evaluation of the combined effects of endocrine disruptors on the development of breast cancer.

Under the Superfund Basic Research Program, the current body burdens of persistent pollutants are being determined in urban anglers with a special focus on low income and minority anglers. Additional research projects in the Division include an occupational epidemiologic study of skin and other cancers in dock builders in New York City and New Jersey; a cross-sectional study designed to assess barriers for obtaining a healthy diet among diabetics in East Harlem; a pilot study to investigate occupational exposures within the pharmaceutical industry and reproductive health effects; and studies on the health impacts of work stress on risk of hypertension cardiovascular disease, musculoskeletal disorders and psychological disorders among autoworkers and health care workers. In addition, several members of the Epidemiology Division are involved in a seven-year cohort study in the Division of Environmental Health Science on environmental and genetic determinants of pubertal development.

Personnel

• G. Berkowitz, Ph.D.
• J. Bernstein, Ph.D.
• J. Britton, Ph.D.
• A. Golden, Ph.D.
• P. Landsbergis, Ph.D.
• K. Morland, Ph.D.
• S. Engel, Ph.D.
• S. Teitelbaum, Ph.D.