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CORVALLIS, Ore. - An Oregon State University epidemiologist has received a competitive award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) designed to support emerging researchers in biomedical, behavioral, or clinical sciences.

Michelle Odden, an assistant professor of epidemiology in the Center for Healthy Aging Research in OSU's College of Public Health and Human Sciences, received $137,532 for the NIH Mentored Research Scientist Development Award.

Older adults are living longer and healthier lives, yet much of the research on cardiovascular disease epidemiology and prevention has been derived from younger people. Odden will identify the strongest risk factors for cardiovascular disease in the Cardiovascular Health Study, an ongoing NIH-funded cohort study of elderly adults.

She will then use a computer simulation of cardiovascular disease to identify the most promising interventions for cardiovascular disease prevention. Her research will account for the unique risks and benefits of cardiovascular prevention in older adults.

Odden holds a doctoral degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and came to OSU from a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, San Francisco.