Faculty Profile

Justin Colacino

Justin Colacino, PhD

  • Associate Professor, Environmental Health Sciences
  • Associate Professor, Nutritional Sciences

Dr. Justin Colacino's research focuses on understanding environmental and dietary factors in the development of chronic diseases like cancer. Specifically, the goal of his research is to characterize the susceptibility of normal stem cell populations to environmental stress, to understand the link between dysregulated development and disease. Of particular interest are understanding the changes that occur at the epigenetic and transcriptional level, changes which affect not only gene expression but also how progenitor cells differentiate and divide. His research group combines wet lab bench work and bioinformatic and statistical analysis of large scale genomic and epidemiologic data sets to translate findings from in vitro models to the population level. Dr. Colacino is an active member of the Society of Toxicology (SOT) and the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) and serves on the Editorial Review Board of Environmental Epigenetics and the Editorial Boards of Toxicological Sciences and Epigenomes.

  • PhD, Environmental Health Sciences, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, 2014
  • MA in Statistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 2014
  • MPH, University of Texas School of Public Health, Dallas, 2009
  • BS in Biochemistry, University of Texas, Austin, 2005

Fort C.A., Colacino J.A., Polemi K.M., Guytingco A, Peraino N.J., Jindaphong S, Kaviya T, Westrick J, Neitzel R, Nambunmee K. Pesticide exposure and adverse health effects associated with farm work in Northern Thailand. Journal of Occupational Health. 63:1 e12222. (2021)

Thong T, Wang Y, Brooks MD, Lee C, Scott C, Balzano L, Wicha MS, Colacino JA. Hybrid stem cell states: Insights into the relationship between mammary development and breast cancer using single-cell transcriptomics. Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology; 8:288. doi: 10.3389/fcell.2020.00288. (2020)

Bakulski K.M., Dou J.F., Thompson R.C., Lee C, Middleton L.Y., Perera B.P.U., Ferris S.P., Jones T.R., Neier K, Zhou X, Sartor M.A., Hammoud S.S., Dolinoy D.C., Colacino J.A.. Single cell analysis of the effects of developmental lead (Pb) exposure on the hippocampus. Toxicological Sciences; 176:396-409. doi: 10.1093/toxsci/kfaa069 (2020)

Nguyen V, Kahana A, Heidt J, Polemi K, Kvasnicka J, Jolliet O, Colacino J.A.. A comprehensive analysis of racial disparities in chemical biomarker concentrations in United States women, 1999-2014. Environment International; 137:105496. doi: 10.1016/j.envint.2020.105496. (2020)

Thong, T, C.A. Fort, E.M. Hill and Colacino J.A. (2019). Environmental exposures, stem cells, and cancer. Pharmacology and Therapeutics. 107398.

Rocco S.A., L. Koneva, L.Y.M. Middleton, T. Thong, S. Solanki, S. Karram, K. Nambunmee, C. Harris, L.S. Rozek, M.A. Sartor, Y.M. Shah and J.A. Colacino. Cadmium exposure inhibits branching morphogenesis and causes alterations consistent with HIF-1a inhibition in human primary breast organoids. Toxicological Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1093/toxsci/kfy112 

Colacino J.A., E. Azizi, M.D. Brooks, S. Fouladdel, S. McDermott, M. Lee, D. Hill, M.A. Sartor, L.S. Rozek, Wicha MS. (2018). Heterogeneity of normal human breast stem and progenitor cells as revealed by transcriptional profiling. Stem Cell Reports. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stemcr.2018.03.001 

Dame M.K, D. Attili, S. McClintock, P.H. Dedhia, P. Ouilette, O. Hardt, A.M. Chin, X. Xue, J. Laliberte, E.K. Katz, G.M. Newsome, D. Hill, A. Miller, D. Agorku, Y.H. Tsai, D. Agorku, C.H. Altheim, A. Bosio, B. Simon, L.C. Samuelson, J.A. Stoerker, H. Appelman, J. Varani, M.S. Wicha, D.E. Brenner, Y.M. Shah, J. Spence and J.A. Colacino (2018). Identification, isolation, and characterization of human LGR5-positive colon adenoma cells. Development. dev.153049

Wang T., E.C. Pehrsson, D. Purushotham, D. Li, B. Zhang, H.A. Lawson, M.A. Province, C. Krapp, Y. Lan, C. Coarfa, T.A. Katz, W.Y. Tang, Z. Wang, S. Biswal, S. Rajapoalan, J.A. Colacino, M.A. Sartor, K. Neier, D. Dolinoy, J. Pinto, R. Hamanaka, G. Mutlu, H.B. Patisaul, D.L. Aylor, G.E. Crawford, L.H. Chadwick, C.G. Duncan, A.E. Garton and K.A. McAllister (2018). The TaRGET II Consortium, Barolomei MS, Walker CL, Tyson FL. The NIEHS TaRGET II Consortium and Environmental Epigenomics. Nature Biotechnology 36, 225-227 doi:10.1038/nbt.4099

Email: colacino@umich.edu 

Address: 6651 SPH I
1415 Washington Heights
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-2029

For media inquiries: sph.media@umich.edu