Ami Zota featured on The Best of Our Knowledge

As always, host Bob Barrett selects an Academic Minute to air during The Best of Our Knowledge.

Each week this program examines some of the issues unique to college campuses, looks at the latest research, and invites commentary from experts and administrators from all levels of education.

For this week‘s edition (#1301), Bob has selected Ami Zota’s segment that explains a new study she did on cadmium and its connection to accelerated aging of human cells—and the risk of developing a serious health problem relatively early in life.  Zota is an assistant professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at the Milken Institute School of Public Health. Her study on cadmium was published in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Ami Zota’s work uses innovative, multi-disciplinary methods to: 1) define sources and consequences of human exposure to environmental contaminants; 2) identify how environmental hazards may interact with social disadvantage and psychosocial stressors to exacerbate health disparities; and 3) evaluate the impact of NGO and regulatory action on emerging environmental health problems. 

Dr. Zota currently has a K99/R00 Career Development Award from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to develop conceptual and methodological frameworks for examining the independent and potentially synergistic effects of endocrine-disrupting chemicals and psychosocial stressors on perinatal outcomes. Her research has been featured in Environmental Health News, the Huffington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and other publications.

Before joining GW, Zota studied human exposure and health effects of endocrine-disrupting chemicals at the Silent Spring Institute and then later at the University of California, San Francisco’s Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment. At Milken Institute School of Public Health, she serves as co-director of Culminating Experiences for MPH students in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. 

Listen to The Best of Our Knowledge on WAMC.org or any of its carriage stations.