Major Goals: The purpose of this study is to leverage our ongoing NOVI study of approximately 600 infants born <30 weeks PMA and follow them through age 7 to determine potential mechanisms that lead to developmental outcomes. Our long-term goal is to discern which of these infants are most likely to become developmentally impaired. Environmental exposures, behavioral, genetic variation and epigenetic factors are required to understand the mechanisms involved.

Major Goals: The goal of this proposal is to test four novel, noninvasive clinical predictors of NOWS in newborns and as markers of neurodevelopmental impairment at 6 and 18 months: Newborn neurobehavioral assessments, newborn cry, prenatal substance exposure measured via maternal hair, and adverse socioeconomic environments.

Major Goals: We will utilize cry and neurobehavioral assessments that are being collected as part of unique pregnancy and birth cohort at a large regional hospital. A 2-stage screening and evaluation process will identify children with autism by 24 to 36 months of age. Ongoing analyses will be conducted to identify neonatal cry and neurobehavioral characteristics that are associated with risk for autism using signal detection methods and complex conditional statistical models.

Major Goals: This study proposes a longitudinal study of epigenomics to examine whether trajectories of DNA methylation and epigenetic aging in childhood are influenced by neonatal medical complications and neurobehavioral profiles, and whether they are informative for later neurobehavioral impairments. We also aim to develop an algorithm that incorporates childhood epigenomic factors with other known risk factors to improve the precision of predictions about which infants are at highest risk for developmental impairments.

Major Goals: Using two national cohorts of over 4 million publicly and privately insured pregnancies and state of the art epidemiologic methods, the study team will evaluate the risk of neurodevelopmental outcomes following in utero exposure to specific psychotropic medications (i.e., mood stabilizers and other anticonvulsant drugs, antidepressants, antipsychotics, psychostimulants).

Major Goals: The goal of this project is to identify exposures and mechanisms that link the environment in early life to childhood development and health outcomes using the Extremely Low Gestation Age Newborn (ELGAN) Study.

Major Goals: We will utilize cry and neurobehavioral assessments that are being collected as part of unique pregnancy and birth cohort at a large regional hospital. A 2-stage screening and evaluation process will identify children with autism by 24 to 36 months of age. Ongoing analyses will be conducted to identify neonatal cry and neurobehavioral characteristics that are associated with risk for autism using signal detection methods and complex conditional statistical models.

Major Goals: Our study aims to test whether the impact on the stress response system is associated with neurodevelopment in early childhood among infants that were born preterm, who are at heightened risk of long term mental and behavioral problems.

Major Goals: This Administrative Supplement is to develop a cloud-based system for the automated analysis of infant cry acoustical characteristics for the diagnosis of NOWS. The proposed software will enable us to have a fully automatic system, where a user records a baby cry in the newborn nursery using a phone or other connected device, and within a few seconds, receives the diagnostic result.

Major Goals: Our computerized technology provides an objective measure of cry and will improve the accuracy of NAS diagnosis. We will develop a hand-held device to be used by nurses and physicians that will use a “cloud based” algorithm to determine if an infant’s cry meets criteria for NAS. Improving the diagnosis of NAS will reduce hospital stays, lower costs and most importantly, provide better treatment for these infants.

Major Goals: This study investigates the impact of prenatal cannabis use on infant neurobehavioral development as well as key plausible biological pathways.

Major Goals: The proposed study is an intensive prospective investigation of three groups of mother-fetus pairs: E-cig users, Cig users and Controls. Comprehensive measures of fetal growth, neural structures, and neurobehavioral development will be assessed over pregnancy using 2D and 3D ultrasonography followed by neonatal ultrasound and neurobehavioral assessment. Maternal and fetal nicotine, combustion and carcinogenicity biomarkers will also be assessed.

Major Goals: The goal of this project is to evaluate the prevalence of alcohol use and other substance use in verbally fluent individuals with ASD in the adolescent to young adult period, and to conduct a focused, short term longitudinal follow up study to characterize the progression of substance use problems and to identify risk and protective factors in this population.

Major Goals: The primary hypothesis driving this research is that cumulative pain/stress experiences in early life combined with certain gut microbiomes and specific genomic susceptibilities increase the risk of neurodevelopmental morbidity in preterm infants during infancy and early childhood.