Research Centers & Initiatives

Within more than 30 research centers at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, faculty, staff, and students explore a wide range of topics, from childhood obesity and chronic disease to health care costs and access.

Research Centers

Center for Cancer Biostatistics

The Center for Biostatistics collaborates with investigators at the University of Michigan’s Rogel Cancer Center on cancer-related research. The center is involved in all stages of the research process, from the design stage through data analysis to scientific interpretation.

Center for Respiratory Virus Research and Response

The Center for Respiratory Virus Research and Response brings together a group of scientists working on elements leading to the understanding of the spread, clinical characteristics and impact of respiratory infections with the goal of prevention and control. The work mainly focuses on influenza, Covid-19 and RSV, but involves other viral respiratory diseases as well, using laboratory and analytic tools to develop and evaluate new and existing response strategies.

Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Center (UM-CEHC)

Funded in 2013 by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Center studies if and how exposure to EDC mixtures (bisphenol A, phthalates, lead and cadmium) during pregnancy and puberty affects growth, sexual maturation, and risk of metabolic syndrome. The UM-CEHC also explores whether diet can alter these effects. Research findings aim to foster a better understanding of how chemicals and diet interact and inform the design of future interventions to improve children's health.

Detroit Community-Academic Urban Research Center

The Detroit Community-Academic Urban Research Center (Detroit URC) is a collaboration of representatives from multiple Detroit community-based organizations, health and human service agencies and academic researchers from the University of Michigan who work together to foster and support community-based participatory research partnerships aimed at promoting health equity in the city of Detroit. The Detroit URC Board, composed of representatives of each of the partner organizations, oversees all aspects of the Center in accordance with a set of CBPR principles and operating norms adopted by the Detroit URC Board. Our mission is to enhance understanding of the relationship between the social and physical environmental determinants of health, and translate that knowledge into public health interventions, programs, and policies aimed at promoting health equity. Through several different Detroit URC-affiliated partnerships and projects, we work in multiple communities in Detroit, characterized by differences in history, race and ethnicity, language, economic composition, and community organization. 

Center for Evaluating Health Reform (CEHR)

The Center for Evaluating Health Reform aims to advance our knowledge of health system reform through the rigorous evaluation of policy changes and assessing the effects of health system interventions. Additionally, CEHR leverages team innovations to improve the process of academic research.

Michigan Farmworker Project

The MFP evolved organically as a community-engaged collaboration between state and regional farmworker service provision entities (Office of the Migrant Affairs, Migrant Resource Councils) and legal services organizations (Michigan Immigrant Rights Center and Farmworker Legal Services). The MFP employs community-based participatory principles (CBPR) principles and Critical Race Theory as both are suitable for social epidemiologic research with farmworkers, a historically marginalized and oppressed population.

Griffith Leadership Center (GLC)

The Griffith Leadership Center promotes and supports excellence in health management and policy leaders by strengthening the connections among research, teaching, and practice. The GLC creates opportunities for lifelong learning and leadership development. In addition, the center leads initiatives to promote and support translational research that addresses critical health and health policy issues to improve health management and policy decision-making.

Health Behavior & Health Equity Genetics Research Group

The HBHE Genetics Research Group’s mission is to improve understanding of the behavioral implications of expanding genetic knowledge.

Center for Health Communications Research (CHCR)

The Center for Health Communications Research is a National Cancer Institute Center of Excellence working to develop and employ a systematic, iterative process for discovering optimal population-based health communications strategies tailored to specific characteristics of the individual.

Housing Solutions for Health Equity

Housing Solutions for Health Equity informs local, state, and national policy through interdisciplinary research on housing as it relates to equity in health, race, socio-economic status, and aging. We envision a world where decent, safe, affordable, and healthy housing is available to everyone.

Kidney Epidemiology and Cost Center (KECC)

The Kidney Epidemiology and Cost Center is an interdisciplinary research group drawing from the University of Michigan’s departments of Biostatistics, Health Management and Policy, Surgery, and Nephrology. KECC’s mission is to promote health, improve clinical practice and patient outcomes, optimize resource utilization, and inform public policy regarding organ failure and organ transplantation. The center pursues this mission through high quality research, advances in biostatistics, and post-graduate education and training.

Center for Managing Chronic Disease

The Center for Managing Chronic Disease aims to build the capacity for effective chronic disease prevention and management. The center's focus is people at risk and those who help them—families, clinicians, communities, and systems—with emphasis on the most vulnerable. The center conducts innovative research and disseminates results that can help to change policy and practice.

Michigan Center for Infectious Disease Threats and Pandemic Preparedness (MCIDT)

The Michigan Center for Infectious Disease Threats and Pandemic Preparedness (MCIDT) is dedicated to improving local and global health through research on infectious diseases and building capacity to respond to novel threats as they emerge.

Michigan Center on Lifestage Environmental Exposures and Disease (M-LEEAD)

The Michigan Center on Lifestage Environmental Exposures and Disease is an interdisciplinary Environmental Health Sciences Core Center with two overarching goals: to accelerate research that defines and explains impacts of environmental exposures during vulnerable stages of life and to promote translation of these findings to improve medical and public health interventions for the mitigation of human disease. M-LEEAD implements its mission through infrastructural support for research provided by integrated center programs and services that include a Pilot Project Program, three Facility Cores, and a Research Engagement Program encompassing three Research Teams. Research is coupled with engagement of stakeholder communities through a Community Outreach and Engagement Core (COEC). The center also trains and mentors future leaders in environmental health sciences through its Career Development Program.

Michigan Ovarian Cancer Science and Innovation Consortium (MOSAIC)

MOSAIC brings together physicians and scientists from diverse disciplines to further the development and execution of ovarian cancer research, with members from the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and The Van Andel Institute. ​The primary objective of this group is to improve understanding of ovarian cancer prevention, treatment, and survival through novel approaches by a multidisciplinary team.

Michigan Public Health Integrated Center for Outbreak Analytics and Modeling

MICOM is a collaborative initiative funded by the CDC's Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics that brings together the University of Michigan and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS). We are dedicated to developing and integrating advanced modeling and data analytics tools into public health practice to address both public health emergencies and ongoing infectious disease threats.

The Michigan Public Health - Substance Use Policy and Economic Research Network

The Network has brought together interdisciplinary teams of investigators with expertise in health economics, policy evaluation, health services research, and patient outcome research to advance addiction research and translate our collective knowledge into scientifically-informed policy recommendations for prevention and treatment of substance use disorders, advancing health equity, and addressing underlying addictions. Much of the Network’s work focuses on access to treatment for opioid use disorder and policies surrounding the opioid epidemic.

Center for Midlife Science

The Center for Midlife Science specializes in the study of multifaceted diseases—usually chronic diseases such as arthritis, diabetes, and osteoporosis—particularly their initiation and progression in the midlife.

Center for Molecular and Clinical Epidemiology of Infectious Diseases (MAC-EPID)

MAC-EPID combines population approaches with modern molecular genetic techniques to better understand the pathogenesis, transmission, and evolution of infectious agents that impact human health, and ultimately to translate this understanding to the prevention and treatment of the diseases these agents cause.

Momentum Center: Driving Discovery to End Childhood Obesity

The Momentum Center is a catalyst for discovery and the reversal of trends related to childhood obesity.

Multidisciplinary Ovarian Cancer Outcomes Group (MOCOG)

MOCOG brings together a dynamic team of international researchers to study long-term survivors of high-grade serous ovarian cancer. Broadly, they aim to understand which factors may allow some patients to survive for many years after diagnosis, including immunologic, genetic, and lifestyle factors.

National Center for School Safety (NCSS)

The National Center for School Safety (NCSS) is a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional training and technical assistance center committed to improving school safety and preventing school violence. NCSS provides comprehensive and accessible support to Students, Teachers, and Officers Preventing (STOP) School Violence grantees and the school safety community nationwide. NCSS is funded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance and serves as the national training and technical assistance provider for the STOP School Violence Program.

National Community-Based Organization Network (NCBON)

The National Community-Based Organization Network (NCBON) was established in 2004 by members of the Community Based Public Health (CBPH) Caucus in affiliation with the American Public Health Association (APHA). Community Based Organization (CBO) members of the Caucus concluded that if their role as community partners was to be fully realized, they needed to develop an effective network of CBOs who want to partner with academic institutions and government agencies to carry out research and solve community problems. 

Network for Public Health Law

The Network for Public Health Law builds relationships, delivers technical assistance, and provides training to lawyers, public health practitioners, advocates, and policy-makers on how to use law to improve the public's health.

Nutrition Obesity Research Center (NORC)

Established in 2010 and funded by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), the University of Michigan’s NORC is one of 12 US centers designed to inspire and support translational, multidisciplinary research in obesity and nutrition, across the continuum of basic science to applications in individuals (medicine) and populations (public health).

Center for Occupational Health and Safety Engineering (COHSE)

COHSE is a NIOSH Education and Research Center (ERC). The mission of the center is to serve the region, nation, and world as a center of excellence for research and graduate education in occupational health and safety.

Center for Precision Health Data Science

Investigators affiliated with the Center for Precision Health Data Science develop principled data science methods for inference and prediction with large, heterogeneous data sources often collected from databases not designed for population-based research. The center’s goal is to disseminate user-friendly analytic and visualization tools for health researchers aspiring to reduce disease and improve health for the population and the patient.

Prevention Research Center of Michigan (PRC)

The mission of the Prevention Research Center of Michigan is to create and foster knowledge, resulting in more effective public health programs and policies. The center conducts community-based prevention research to improve health and prevent disease, especially focused on populations with a disproportionate share of poor health outcomes.

Region V Public Health Training Center

The Region V Public Health Training Center provides continuing education to those who promote and protect the health and quality of life in our communities. The training center offers face-to-face and online instruction to students drawn from state and local health departments, community-based organizations, health delivery systems, and health plans, as well as those studying public health.

Center for Sexuality and Health Disparities (SEXLAB)

The Center for Sexuality and Health Disparities conducts applied social research on sexuality-related health disparities. The center’s studies seek to identify innovative strategies to inform sexual health promotion interventions, including the prevention of HIV/STI infection and transmission, and decrease other sexuality-related health disparities.

Center for Social Epidemiology and Population Health (CSEPH)

CSEPH is an inter- and multidisciplinary effort devoted to understanding health inequalities from socioeconomic, behavioral, social, psychological, biological, developmental, community, and international perspectives.

The Social Care in Chronic Disease Collaborative

The Social Care in Chronic Disease Collaborative advances the science on addressing social context in chronic disease management.  Towards this goal, we engage in interdisciplinary research and evaluation, provide opportunities to students and trainees, and translate our research and innovations into clinical and public health practice and policy advancement. Multiple social risks (e.g. food and/or housing insecurity, transportation challenges, social isolation) and economic burden from out-of-pocket, disease-related expenses are key barriers to achieving health equity in chronic disease outcomes. We believe that advancing innovation in addressing these social factors for people managing chronic disease can improve population health and improve health disparities.

Statistical Analysis of Biomedical and Educational Research (SABER)

Part of the Center for the Advancement of Clinical Research (CACR), SABER provides expertise in clinical trial design, outcomes research, quality-of-life research, database management, and data analysis for multi-center clinical trials and multidisciplinary research.

Center for Statistical Genetics

The Center for Statistical Genetics encourages methodological and applied research at the interface between the mathematical sciences and genetics. The center supports collaborative research to increase understanding of human health, disease, and evolution, and encourages collaboration and technology transfer between academia and private industry.

Center for Value-Based Insurance Design (VBID)

V-BID engages in the design, evaluation, and promotion of health insurance products created to achieve improvements in health outcomes while managing costs faced by patients and employers.

Youth Violence Prevention Center

The Youth Violence Prevention Center is one of seven CDC-funded Academic Centers of Excellence working to develop, implement, and evaluate promising youth violence prevention efforts. The center’s partners include the Genesee County Health Department, health systems, community organizations, law enforcement, Michigan State University, and the University of Michigan School of Public Health.

Initiatives and Programs

Apple Hearing Study

The Apple Hearing Study is a partnership between the University of Michigan and Apple to study sound exposure and its impact on hearing health. This groundbreaking study will advance our understanding of how hearing could be impacted over time by exposure to sound at certain levels. Researchers will measure headphone and environmental sound exposures over time among participants and determine how these exposures impact hearing and stress levels. The study will provide a better understanding of listening behavior and its overall impact on hearing health. This information will in turn help guide public health policy and prevention programs designed to protect and promote hearing health in the US and globally.

ELSI Research Training Program

The University of Michigan’s ELSI Research Training Program, funded by the National Institutes of Health, seeks to prepare the next generation of ELSI scholars for success as innovative, impactful investigators.

GLOBAL STATCORE

The Biostatistics core for global health, GLOBAL STATCORE, is an initiative intended to enhance biostatistical support of global public health research, education, and training at Michigan Public Health, the University of Michigan, and in collaboration with international partners across the globe.

Healthy Environments Partnership (HEP)

HEP is a project of the Detroit Community-Academic Urban Research Center. HEP represents a partnership between various Detroit-based and Detroit area organizations working together to learn more about how the social environment and the physical environment in three Detroit neighborhoods are linked to risk for heart disease.

Michigan Integrative Well-Being and Inequality (MIWI) Training Program

The MIWI Training Program is a state-of-the-art, interdisciplinary methods training program that prepares participating scholars to investigate the intersection of mental and physical health, with an emphasis on how this intersection relates to health disparities. The training encompasses conceptual frameworks, study designs, data collection needs, and analytic approaches necessary to conduct this innovative research. The program includes an intensive four-day summer institute in Ann Arbor, followed by ongoing collaboration with a mentorship team.

Public Health IDEAS

The world is full of complex and far-reaching public health issues, requiring ambitious, comprehensive, multidisciplinary approaches. Our Public Health IDEAS initiative aims to do just that, by bringing together experts to tackle some of our biggest challenges. Public Health IDEAS—which stands for Interdisciplinary Discovery, Engagement + Actions for Society—is a school-level effort to increase interdiscplinary collaboration around key topics in an effort to identify lasting solutions to some of our most pressing public health issues, from firearm injury prevention to urban health and equity.