Trainees
Our RETCC trainees participate in multiple projects and community engagement opportunities across the Columbia University Northern Plains Superfund Research Program. Below, Core leaders Drs. Annie Nigra and Ben Bostick with RETCC trainees during the CUNP-SRP kick-off event in December 2022.
Current Trainees
Ellen Bannon
- PhD student, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Ellen Bannon’s research focuses on understanding how environmental metal exposures, particularly lithium and uranium, influence human health, with an emphasis on cardiovascular health and disease.

Stephanie Calluori
- PhD student, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Using epidemiological methods, Stephanie’s research examines the effects of environmental exposures on epigenetic biomarkers, and the ultimate impact on women’s and children’s health.

Grace Cammarata
- MPH student, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Grace is pursuing an MPH in the Environmental Health Sciences department at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Her work focuses on leverging social determinants of health and community-based participatory research to enhance environmental justice.

Carolyn Gigot, PhD
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Dr. Carolyn Gigot is an environmental epidemiologist interested in novel biomarkers of environmental exposures and health effects.

Wending Li, PhD
- Postdoctoral Research Scientist, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Wending’s research investigates the cardio-metabolic effect of arsenic and employs advanced deconvolution method to understand how environmental exposure may elicit tissue-specific response in humans.

Kevin Patterson
- PhD student, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Kevin's work focuses on environmental justice in American Indian and Native communities.

Adelina Rolea
- PhD student, Columbia University
Adelina's research focuses on mitigating the exposure of hazardous substances on vulnerable populations, and her approach as a geochemist is to center environmental justice and community involvement in both research and fieldwork.

Grace Santos
- PhD student, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Grace’s research focuses on analyzing selenium speciation in the Strong Heart Study and plans to examine the underlying genetic and non-genetic determinants of selenium metabolism and its mechanistic involvement in diabetes risk.

Anna Tillery, PhD
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
Anna’s research focuses on understanding the impact of rural air pollution exposures on cardiovascular health and electronic cigarettes.

Alumni Trainees
- Maria Argos, PhD
- Shams Azad, PhD
- Zahid Aziz, PhD
- Anne Bozack, PhD
- Felicia Castriota, PhD
- Adina Cazacu-De Luca, BS
- Clara Chang, PhD
- Christine George, PhD
- Yu Chen, PhD
- Saugata Datta, PhD
- Ratan Dhar, PhD
- Christian Dye, PhD
- Sara Flanagan, DrPH
- Danella Hafeman, MD, PhD
- Marni Hall, PhD
- Megan Hall, PhD (Post-doc)
- Ezazul Haque, MS
- Kristin Harper, PhD (Post-doc)
- Yi He, PhD
- Allan Horneman, PhD
- Caitlin Howe, PhD
- Farideh Hosseini Narouei, PhD
- Hun-Bok Jung, PhD
- Alison Keimowitz, PhD
- Khalid Khan, DrPH
- Mohammad Kibriya, MD (Post-doc)
- Peter Knappett, PhD (Post-doc)
- Franziska Landes, PhD
- Mengyuan 'Maggie' Li, PhD
- Wil Lieberman-Cribbin, PhD
- Catherine Lucey, PhD
- Irene Martinez-Morata, MD, PhD
- Melanie Mayer, PhD
- Danielle Medgyesi, PhD
- Arijeet Mitra, PhD
- Stephanie Melkonian, PhD
- Ivan Mihajlov, PhD
- Rajib Mozumder, PhD
- Jessica Napolitano, PhD (Post-doc)
- Megan Niedzwiecki, PhD
- Bethany O'Shea, PhD
- Faruque Parvez, DrPH
- Gene Pesola, MD (Post-doc)
- Brandilyn Peters, PhD
- Meridel Phillips, MS
- Brandon Pierce, PhD (Post-doc)
- J. Richard Pilsner, PhD
- Martha Powers, PhD
- Karrie Radloff, PhD
- Tiffany Sanchez, PhD
- Molly Scannell Bryan, PhD
- Elizabeth Shoenfelt Troein, PhD
- Marisa Sobel, PhD
- Maya Spaur, PhD
- Miranda Spratlen, PhD
- Jing Sun, PhD
- Beth Weinman, PhD
- Karen Wovkulich, PhD
- Qiang Yang, PhD (Post-doc)
- Di Zhao








