# Enriching the Rhode Island Child Health Study

> **NIH NIH U24** · EMORY UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $39,061

## Abstract

Summary Abstract
 Our overarching goal is to sustain, enrich and diversify resource infrastructure for the Rhode Island
Children’s Health Study (RICHS; Marsit, Stroud MPI: R24ES028507) by facilitating future longitudinal follow-
up, accelerating data management and sharing, and diversifying the scientific workforce. RICHS was
developed to characterize the impact of the environment on newborn and early childhood health outcomes
with a novel and unique focus on the mechanistic role of placenta molecular function in mediating the
impact of the chemical, physical, social, and behavioral environment on infant/child health and disease. The
cohort is comprised of 840 mother-infant pairs from the Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts
region enrolled using a population-based recruitment strategy. RICHS offspring at the start of this project
range in age from 8.8-13.8 years—a critical period for environmental influences on development. Data and
results from the cohort have made seminal contributions to elucidating (a) the fundamental molecular biology
of the placenta, (b) the impact of environmental exposures on placental epigenetic and genomic regulation,
(c) links between placental molecular variation and newborn growth and neurobehavioral outcomes, as well
as (d) novel methods development. Resources/investigators from the RICHS cohort contributed to 75
publications (42 during the R24 period), 10 NIH grants including fellowship and career development awards
for early career scientists, and >20 post/doctoral projects. The proposed U24 infrastructure support will
facilitate prospective, longitudinal assessments of novel child health and disease outcomes, postnatal
environmental exposures, structural and social determinants of health, as well as continued collection of
biospecimens into the RICHS biorepository. The U24 will also support enrichment of data management and
broad sharing of cohort resources, with all activities aimed at providing opportunities for a diverse cadre of
scientists across career stages to access to data and biospecimens to develop novel research questions.
Specifically, the goals of this R24 infrastructure support project are to (1) support the infrastructure of diverse
workforce of the cohort, (2) continue to obtain longitudinal data on mother-child pairs, (3) broaden the
diversity of RICHS by facilitating enrollment of new participants from complementary Rhode Island cohorts,
(4) refine and expand systems for broad sharing of cohort data and resources, (5) increase opportunities for
scholars from historically under-represented groups to engage with the RICHS cohort, and (6) work with the
consortium in developing integrated measures and common strategies for data sharing and collaboration.
Ultimately, U24 infrastructure support will maximize NIEHS investment by increasing diversity of
participants, workforce, and measures in this highly unique and productive cohort, accelerating
discovery and catalyzing future transformative ...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 11064466
- **Project number:** 3U24ES028507-07S1
- **Recipient organization:** EMORY UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Carmen Joseph Marsit
- **Activity code:** U24 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $39,061
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2017-09-30 → 2027-10-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11064466

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 11064466, Enriching the Rhode Island Child Health Study (3U24ES028507-07S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/11064466. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*