2023-2024
EMERGING SCHOLARS PROGRAM
Nazsa Baker
Research Director/Program Manager at University of California, School of Medicine & The Wraparound Project
Nazsa Baker, PhD, MA is the Research Director and Program Manager for the Wraparound Project at UCSF School of Medicine, Department of Surgery. Dr. Baker completed a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center within the Rutgers, School of Public Health before transitioning to UCSF. Her research examines Black men who survive their firearm injuries, hospital-based violence intervention programs (HVIPs), firearm acquired physical disabilities, and adverse lifespan experiences among firearm violence survivors. Dr. Baker is a community-based qualitative researcher who is passionately dedicated to highlighting, uplifting, and centering the narratives of Black men who survive their firearm injuries. She is a champion for equitable, rigorous, culturally congruent, and responsive research in historically marginalized Black and Brown communities.
Christopher Carey
Christopher Carey has a background in behavioral modification, exercise science, and the pathophysiology of type 2 diabetes and its related conditions. His primary focus lies in examining the impact of psychosocial stress on cognitive decline, particularly within Black individuals. He is seeking mentorship from experts with an understanding of cognitive function and advanced technological methods for analysis.
Emmanuel Epenge
Neurologist, Research Fellow
Emmanuel Epenge is a neurologist and Atlantic fellow for equity in Brain Health. Researching protective factors, cognitive and biological markers of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia is my motivation to significantly decrease the spread of dementia. Raising awareness and implementing local solutions with different stakeholders are key strategies to reduce the impact of dementia worldwide.
Christopher Howard
Dr. Christopher Howard's training has centered on cognitive aging and health disparities. His goal is to continue to bridge the gap between underserved communities and those who may not have equitable access to neuropsychological testing and the field of neuropsychology.
Neke Nsor
Neke Nsor's interests included understanding the effects of lifestyle factors on cognitive impairment, Alzheimer's disease, and related disorders. Her training includes neuropsychological testing, data analysis in Jamovi, SPSS, MATLAB, and she has recently started learning MPlus.
Tabia Pope
Clinical Instructor; Co-Director, B.R.A.I.N Lab
Dr. Tabia Pope is a Clinical Instructor of Speech-Language Pathology at the University of the District of Columbia and currently co-directs the B.R.A.I.N. Lab, where she engages in brain health and injury prevention, research, assessment, innovative interventions, and neurocognitive training. Dr. Pope works with athletic trainers and football coaches to integrate brain health coaching, mindfulness and cognitive-communication tasks into African American football players' sports drills, fitness routines, and daily activities in order to examine their cognitive-communication outcomes in the areas of attention, reaction time, auditory processing, memory, thought organization, word finding, reasoning, problem solving, sequencing, planning, organizing, and social communication.
Paul Robbins
Paul Robbins is a developmental scientist who investigates the psychosocial processes by which context, culture, and identity mitigate or exacerbate inequitable health and educational outcomes at various life stages. Specifically, his work examines the developmental contexts and consequences of participation in families, sports, and religious institutions to identify mechanisms that ensure optimal wellbeing within these spaces. Paul has expertise in elucidating domains of developmental diversity in adolescence and understanding strategies for fostering resilience, particularly in Black youth, families, and communities.
Joy Stradford
Doctoral Student
SDSU/UCSD Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology
Joy Stradford achieved her B.S. in psychology from Howard University and her M.S. in neuroimaging and informatics from the University of Southern California. Joy is currently a first year doctoral student in the SDSU/UCSD Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology, studying under the mentorship of Dr. Erin Sundermann and Dr. Sarah Banks. Her research focus is on health disparities in Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias and she is currently exploring how lifestyle factors and cumulative disadvantage impact tau accumulation and cognitive outcomes in Black women. She is excited to join cohort 3 of the BMBH Emerging Scholars Program and is looking forward to examining similarities and sex differences in Black men and Black women’s risk for ADRD in the future.
Eleanna Varangis
Eleanna Varangis is a cognitive neuroscientist with specific training in the application of neuroimaging methods to the study of aging and concussion. Her program of research concerns the long-term effects of exposure to collision sports and/or concussions on neurocognitive health and function in the context of aging.
Charisse Winston
Dr. Winston is an Assistant Professor at the University of Southern California (USC) in the Keck School of Medicine. She joined the Department of Physiology and Neuroscience in August 2023 after completing her post-doctoral training and MOSAIC K99 fellowship at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). She received her Bachelor’s in Biochemistry from the University of Virginia, her Master’s in Biochemistry, and her PhD in Neuroscience from Georgetown University.
Dr. Charisse Winston is a translational neuroscientist interested in advancing the field of biofluid-based extracellular vesicles (EV) as biomarkers for early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease and other age-related dementias. The overall goal of Dr. Winston’s research is to advance the field of AD diagnostics and develop novel EV-based tools for ethnically diverse and underserved patient groups, specifically Black Americans and the Diaspora. Furthermore, Dr. Winston’s research aims to uncover the molecular mechanisms behind the physiological and pathogenic roles of EVs in both healthy aging and disease.
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As a Black Men's Brain Healthy Diversity Scholar, Dr. Winston seeks to extend her previous EV research in blood to explore the biomarker potential of saliva EVs as early diagnostic tools for AD in multi-ethnic populations.
Faculty Mentors
Robert L. Newton, Jr. PhD - Professor; Director, Physical Activity & Ethnic Minority Health laboratory
Pennington Biomedical Research Center
Dr. Newton is a Professor and director of the Physical Activity & Ethnic Minority Health laboratory at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center. His overall research program examines the effect of lifestyle interventions, including physical activity and weight loss, on the health of African Americans. One line of research investigates health promotion in African American men and another area specifically addresses the effect of non-pharmacological interventions on cognitive function in older, urban and rural dwelling African American adults. Many of the investigations utilize a community-engaged approach and often incorporate digital technology to foster behavior change. Currently, Dr. Newton leads investigations of physical activity in African American men, women, and older adults.
Keenan Walker, PhD - Tenure-Track Investigator
National Institute on Aging Intramural Research Program
Dr. Walker is a Tenure-Track Investigator at the National Institute on Aging’s Intramural Research Program. His research program focuses on understanding the role of abnormal immune function and inflammation in Alzheimer's disease and late-life cognitive decline. He uses proteomic, genetic, and multimodal neuroimaging methods applied to large longitudinal cohort studies to understand disease biology and identify novel therapeutic targets and biomarkers. Other areas of research include understanding the mechanisms leading to cognitive decline following critical illness and major infection, and evaluating the role of vascular risk factors and physical frailty in Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.
Yonas E. Geda, MD, MSc - Professor of Neurology, Program Director.
Barrow Neurological Institute
Dr. Geda is a behavioral neurologist with expertise on lifestyle factors (e.g., physical activity), neuropsychiatric symptoms, and mild cognitive impairment and related disorders. He earned his M.D. from Addis Ababa (Haile Selassie) University, Ethiopia. He then trained at Mayo clinic, subsequently becoming Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry. After a 25 years at Mayo Clinic, he then joined Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix as Professor of Neurology and program director.