Michele Evans

Background

About Michele Evans

Dr.Evans is, an internist, medical oncologist, and health disparities researcher who currently serves as the Deputy Scientific Director of the National Institute on Aging (NIA) and the Training Director for its Intramural Research Program. She received her medical degree from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, The Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. She received her postgraduate training in internal medicine at the Emory University School of Medicine and fellowship training in medical oncology within at the National Cancer Institute (NCI). Interest in human cancer prone disorders and DNA repair led her to study the role of DNA repair in cancer susceptibility as a Senior Clinical Investigator in the Laboratory of Molecular Pharmacology, NCI. At the National Institute on Aging (NIA), her major research interest centers on the biological and behavioral underlying health disparities. Research Interests: The overall goal of her research program has been to conduct translational research defined as a multidisciplinary effort that creates a bi-directional bridge between population- based clinical research and basic science laboratory studies. The central hypotheses focus on understanding which behavioral, psychosocial, and/or molecular and biological mechanisms may be driving factors in the development of health disparities and examining the role of oxidative DNA damage, oxidative stress and oxidative DNA repair in the development of age-related disease. In keeping with this perspective, she has simultaneously developed the Health Disparities Research Section (HDRS) and the DNA Repair Unit (DRU) within the National Institute on Aging’s intramural research program. These two components serve as the research infrastructure for the clinical and basic science projects whose nexus facilitates translation which she believes occurs when both clinical and basic science components are interdependent and pursuing related hypotheses.