Dr. Jo Ivey Boufford – Lab co-founder and head faculty advisor Dr. Boufford kicks off the first lab meeting each semester by giving an overview of Urban Health as well as the goals of the lab.
Fall 2022
Mentalla Ismail – Mentalla Ismail is a Doctor of Public Health candidate in the School of Global Public Health at New York University. She earned her BS in Biology and Neuroscience at the University of Cincinnati. Mentalla discussed the non-profit organization she founded, Refuge Collaborative, which focuses on creating education accessibility for refugee students through mentorship.
Dr. Alexis Merdjanoff – Lab co-founder and faculty advisor Dr. Merdjanoff is a Clinical Assistant Professor in Social and Behavioral Sciences at New York University’s School of Global Public Health. She is a public health sociologist who explores how population health is affected by exposure to natural hazards, including hurricanes, floods, extreme heat and wildfires. She discussed her research on Hurricane Ian’s impact on the Florida west coast as well as her background in researching other natural disasters and their effect on population health.
Spring 2023
Karina Weinstein – Program Strategy & Innovation Director at FXB International, Karina spoke with the lab about the NGO FXB International’s efforts to fight against extreme poverty as well as their mission to empower youth to implement climate solutions.
Natalia Gonzalez Varela and Karina Palacio – NYU MPH graduates and former lab members Natalia Gonzalez Varela, MPH (left) and Karina Palacio, MPH (right) spoke to the lab about their experience working with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) on their Healthy Cities Network program.
Dr. Rumi Chunara – NYU Associate Professor of Biostatistics, Associate Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at NYU Tandon, and Director of the Center for Health Data Science, Dr. Chunara discussed with the lab her work developing computational and statistical approaches for acquiring, integrating and using data to improve population-level public health. Her lab, the Chunara Lab, develops computational and statistical methods across data mining, natural language processing, spatio-temporal analyses and machine learning, to study population health.
Fall 2023
Dr. Prasad Liyanage – Former faculty member of the NYU School of Global Public Health, Dr. Liyanage pursued a research degree evaluating the impact of climate and public health interventions on Aedes vectors and dengue in Sri Lanka. He spoke to the lab about the intersection of vector-borne disease research and urban health.
Dr. Masoud Ghandehari – Dr. Ghandehari serves on the Faculty of Civil and Urban Engineering at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering and is an associate faculty at the NYU Center for Urban Science and Progress. His research focus is on urban systems engineering and the application of advanced instrumentation and data analysis targeting the aging, health and performance of infrastructure systems. He spoke to the lab about his research on sensing technology designed to measure air quality in the NYC subway system.
Sarah Ruel-Bergeron, RA – Sarah is the Director of Healthy Housing at the International Society for Urban Health (ISUH). She is a licensed architect and global health expert who has won awards and international recognition for her previous work for Archive Global, implementing housing interventions that improve health outcomes in at-risk communities around the world. Sarah spoke to the lab about her work implementing housing interventions in at-risk communities around the globe.
Spring 2024
Olivia Flynn – Olivia is a multidisciplinary project manager, researcher, and strategist at Gehl, motivated to create cities that make people’s lives happier and healthier. Through data collection, analysis, and creative storytelling, Olivia creates designs that are reflective of what communities need and prioritize a comfortable human experience, especially for more vulnerable groups such as women and children. Olivia spoke to the lab about her work at Gehl and creating accessible urban spaces for communities around the world.
Dr. Zhaoxi Zhang – Dr. Zhang is an architect and has a PhD in Environmental Science, specializing in sustainable and healthy cities. She is a faculty fellow at the NYU Center for Urban Science and Progress (NYU CUSP) and also a member of our lab. She spoke to the lab about her career journey, emphasizing her work with UN-Habitat in Nairobi, Kenya.
Eduarda Aun – Eduarda is a Program Manager in the Global Designing Cities Initiative’s Streets for Kids (SfK) program. She is an architect and urban designer from Brasilia, Brazil and worked at the NYC Department of Transportation, assisting in the development of the third edition of NYC’s Street Design Manual and in the planning, design, and evaluation of pedestrian-friendly “el-spaces” (spaces under elevated infrastructure) citywide. She led a workshop at the lab that had members walk around NYC streets while looking through a “periscope” to simulate the viewpoint of a small child and identify challenges they may face while navigating a city designed for adults.
Antonia Orr, Radhika Bynon, Michael Parsons, and Rianna Raymond-Williams – Impact on Urban Health is a UK-based organization focused on making the urban inner-city London boroughs of Lambeth and Southwark healthier places for everyone to live. National and International Partnerships Manager Antonia Orr (top left), Portfolio Manager Radhika Bynon (top right), Cross-Program Director Michael Parsons (bottom left), and Portfolio Manager Rianna Raymond-Williams (bottom right) spoke to the lab about their work in London as well as their community research approaches and safety as a social determinant of health.
Dr. Emmanuel Peprah and John Pateña, MPH, MA – Dr. Peprah is an Assistant Professor of Global and Environmental Health at the NYU School of Global Public Health and the programattic focus of his research is understanding the contextual factors that influence the burden of co-morbidity in people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWH), with a particular focus on cardiovascular disease risk factors and mental health. John is a Doctor of Public Health candidate in the School of Global Public Health at New York University and a global mental health implementation researcher with a passion for promoting mental wellbeing and bridging the research-to-practice gap. Dr. Peprah and John are leaders of the NYU School of Global Public Health’s Implementing Sustainable Evidence-based interventions through Engagement (ISEE) Lab. Our lab and the ISEE lab had a joint meeting where we collaborated to address health issues from an urban health and implementation science perspective.