UMASS BOSTON GERONTOLOGY NEWS | |
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Shu Xu, PhD '24 (left) and Anyah Prasad, PhD '24, at their doctoral hooding on May 22 with Professor Jeffrey Burr, who advised both students. | |
Meet our newest gerontology PhDs | |
Congratulations to the five students—Elizabeth Gallagher, Anyah Prasad, Natalie Shellito, Ning Xie, and Shu Xu—who successfully defended their dissertations in the spring of 2024 and were hooded as new PhDs at ceremonies on campus on May 22, 2024. Learn more about their dissertations and where they are headed next at the link below. | |
Department awards honor scholarship, service
The Department of Gerontology at UMass Boston presents five annual awards to deserving graduate students, including Anyah Prasad and Shu Xu, both PhD '24 (shown above), co-winners of the 2024 Dissertation Book Award.
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Survey answers show respondents—older adults who haven't quit smoking—are wary about e-cigarettes but curious to learn about them | |
Could vaping offer harm-reduction option for older adults who aren't willing to quit smoking? | | |
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Older adults who smoke heavily have a hard time kicking the habit, even when they receive the most promising cessation treatment. “These are people who started smoking when they were very young, before we knew of all the dangers,” saysJaqueline Avila, assistant professor of gerontology at UMass Boston (at left). “They are heavily dependent on nicotine [the addictive substance in tobacco].” So Avila is studying a controversial alternative: Testing the harm-reduction potential of asking these long-time smokers to switch from smoking cigarettes to using electronic cigarettes, or vaping. | |
Zhang blends gerontology studies with career in IT to improve aging experience | |
After earning two master's degrees in physics and engineering and working for two decades in the information technology sector, Kunyu Zhang (at right) enrolled in the gerontology doctoral program at UMass Boston with an interest in improving the lives of older people through technological advances. She has published three papers resulting from her doctoral dissertation, among others, and plans to get herself even more up to speed on the potential of artificial intelligence and voice-assisted agents. | |
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Through MIT fellowship, Cohen contributes to new LTSS resource hub | |
The Community Innovators Lab (CoLab) at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has launched a Resource Hub aimed at transforming the field of long-term services and supports and better serving workers, consumers, and family caregivers. Marc Cohen, co-director of the LeadingAge LTSS Center @UMass Boston, supported the development of several studies for the project as a member of the 2022-2023 class of Mel King Community Fellows at MIT. | |
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Gerontology Institute at University of Massachusetts Boston
Wheatley Hall 3rd Floor, Room 124A
UMass Boston,100 Morrissey Blvd., Boston, MA 02125
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