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Margaret Rita Karagas, PhD

Title(s)
Chair and Professor of Epidemiology
Professor of Community and Family Medicine
James W. Squires Professor

Additional Titles/Positions/Affiliations
Director, Center for Biomedical Research Excellence, Center for Molecular Epidemiology
Director, Children's Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research Center

Department(s)
Epidemiology
Community and Family Medicine

Education
University of Washington, PhD 1990

Programs
Dartmouth Cancer Center
Quantitative Biomedical Sciences
SYNERGY

Websites Margaret Karagas - Epidemiology Faculty Profile
Children's Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research Center
Center for Molecular Epidemiology
Cancer Epidemiology
Dartmouth Toxic Metals Superfund Research Program
Graduate Program in Quantitative Biomedical Sciences
The Dartmouth Institute
Dartmouth SYNERGY
View Publications

Contact Information

Department of Epidemiology
1 Medical Center Drive
Williamson Building, 7th floor
Lebanon NH 03756

Office: 760 Williamson Bldg Lebanon, NH
Email: Margaret.Karagas@dartmouth.edu

Assistant:
Asst. Phone:


Professional Interests

Professor Karagas is the inaugural chair of the Department of Epidemiology at the Geisel School of Medicine and director of the Centers for Molecular Epidemiology and Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research at Dartmouth College. As part of her deep commitment to interdisciplinary training, Professor Karagas collaboratively established an innovative, cross-disciplinary postdoctoral and graduate program in the quantitative biomedical sciences (QBS) that integrates epidemiology, bioinformatics, and biostatistics and mentors diverse investigators at all stages of their career. Her research interests encompass interdisciplinary studies that seek to illuminate the causes of human disease by investigating emerging environmental exposures, host factors, and mechanisms -- that impact health from infancy to adult life. Her studies focus on under-studied, rural populations while contributing to large multi-center efforts such as the NIH-funded Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Study, which includes over 90,000 participants across the USA. Her work incorporates high-dimensional analytic tools along with biomarkers and sensors of the exposome, genetic susceptibility and biologic response. These efforts have helped to uncovered adverse cardiometabolic, neurodevelopmental and immune-related pregnancy-child health outcomes as well as carcinogenic effects of drinking water contaminants, food-borne toxicants including in infant first foods, and exposures from woodstoves along with other environmental threats and have led to practice and policy changes. She collaborates globally and has served on international consensus panels and committees for the United Nations, World Health Organization, International Agency for Research on Cancer, European Food Safety Authority, US National Institute of Health and National Academies of Science, and Engineering and Medicine among others.


Selected Publications

 

Air Pollution Exposure and Birth Weight in the ECHO Cohort.
Cowell W, Hsu HL, Just AC, Kloog I, Coull BA, Wilson A, Hipwell AE, Karagas MR, Gilliland FD, Padula AM, Carroll KN, Kerver JM, Ghassabian A, Camargo CA Jr, Dabelea D, Koinis-Mitchell D, D'Sa V, Abul MH, Braun JM, Croen LA, Hartert T, Shiroshita A, Peacock JL, Neiderhiser JM, Leve LD, Ganiban JM, Litonjua AA, McEvoy CT, Haag MB, Schmidt RJ, Goodrich AJ, Lyall K, Volk HE, O'Connor TG, Rich DQ, Porucznik CA, Wright RJ, ECHO Cohort Consortium
JAMA Netw Open. 2025 Dec 1;8(12):e2551459. doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.51459. Epub 2025 Dec 1.
PMID: 41632155

Residential mobility during pregnancy and birth outcomes in the United States: The environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Cohort (2010-2019).
D'Adamo A, Kress AM, Habre R, Towe-Goodman N, Desjardins MR, Alshawabkeh A, Aris IM, Camargo CA Jr, Carroll KN, Cassidy-Bushrow AE, Chu SH, Civil Y, Craft AL, Croen LA, Deoni S, Dsa V, Dunlop AL, Elliott AJ, Ferrara A, Ganiban JM, Ghassabian A, Hartert T, Watts DJ, Karagas MR, Karr CJ, Koinis-Mitchell D, Kramer M, McEvoy CT, Mirzakhani H, O'Connor TG, Perng W, Schmidt RJ, Shah U, Tung I, Wright RJ, Knapp EA, ECHO Cohort Consortium
Ann Epidemiol. 2026 Jan 17;115:15-22. doi: 10.1016/j.annepidem.2026.01.008. Epub 2026 Jan 17.
PMID: 41554464

Prenatal exposure to essential and toxic elements in relation to infant growth trajectories.
Yim G, Heggeseth BC, Gilbert-Diamond D, Peacock JL, Margetaki K, Baker ER, Palys TJ, Jackson BP, Madan JC, Romano ME, Karagas MR, Howe CG
Environ Health. 2026 Jan 9; doi: 10.1186/s12940-025-01252-w. Epub 2026 Jan 9.
PMID: 41514328

Pre- and postnatal exposure to PM(2.5) and NO(2) and blood pressure in children: Results from the ECHO Cohort.
Ni Y, Law A, Gao X, Szpiro AA, Loftus CT, Jones M, Dearborn LC, Hazlehurst MF, Sherris AR, Ilango S, LeWinn KZ, Bush NR, Zhao Q, Trasande L, Flynn JT, Enquobahrie DA, Nguyen RHN, O'Connor T, Vyas AK, Zhang M, Mirzakhani H, Hipwell A, Starling A, Peterson AK, Ghassabian A, Ferrara A, Aschner J, Collingwood S, Karagas MR, Katzow M, Stroustrup A, Haktnair M, Hartert TV, Snyder BM, Jan S, Singh AM, Dabelea D, Malek AM, Straughen JK, Camargo CA Jr, Buxton MA, Wright R, Carroll K, Sanderson K, Mitchell DK, D'Sa V, Hockett C, Dunlop AL, Farzen SF, Mumford SL, Alshawabkeh AN, Santos HP Jr, Zhang X, Niu Z, Ji N, Breton C, Liang D, Karr CJ, ECHO Cohort Consortium
Environ Res. 2026 Mar 1;292:123529. doi: 10.1016/j.envres.2025.123529. Epub 2025 Dec 23.
PMID: 41448419

Gestational fine particulate matter exposure and perinatal outcomes in the ECHO cohort: Associations across pregnancy windows.
Nzegwu AW, Dickerson AS, Miller K, Szpiro A, Hipwell AE, Elliot AJ, Padula AM, Dunlop AL, Starling AP, Ferrara A, Breton CV, Loftus CT, McEvoy CT, Dabelea D, Koinis-Mitchell D, Liang D, Oken E, Barrett ES, Volk H, Gern JE, Stanford JB, Herbstman JB, Wu J, Lyall K, Trasande L, Leve LD, Karagas MR, Pini N, Wright RJ, Nguyen RHN, Schantz SL, O'Connor TG, Sathyanarayana S, Karr CJ, Enquobahrie DA, ECHO Cohort Consortium
Environ Res. 2026 Mar 1;292:123587. doi: 10.1016/j.envres.2025.123587. Epub 2025 Dec 22.
PMID: 41443492

Early-life arsenic exposure modulates the developing microbiome in a rural cohort.
Laue HE, Kook D, Khatchikian C, Coto SD, Jackson BP, Palys TJ, Peacock JL, Karagas MR, O'Toole GA, Hoen AG, Madan JC
Environ Res. 2026 Feb 15;291:123588. doi: 10.1016/j.envres.2025.123588. Epub 2025 Dec 17.
PMID: 41418855

Racial and ethnic disparities in environmental chemical exposures and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy: The ECHO-wide cohort study.
Liu H, Kress AM, Yu EX, Ning X, Ghassabian A, Kahn LG, Mehta-Lee S, Brubaker S, Alshawabkeh A, Meeker J, Camargo CA Jr, Suglia SF, Elliott AJ, Ferrara A, Zhu Y, Gern JE, Bendixsen C, Gold DR, Cassidy-Bushrow AE, Singh AM, Farzan SF, Niu Z, Hipwell AE, Karagas MR, Mirzakhani H, O'Connor TG, Simhan H, Oken E, Sanderson K, Petriello M, Geiger SD, Carroll KN, Lawrence GN, Dunlop AL, Dabelea D, Norman G, Carignan C, Zhao Q, Trasande L, program collaborators for Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes, ECHO Components, ECHO Awardees and Cohorts
Environ Pollut. 2026 Mar 1;392:127452. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2025.127452. Epub 2025 Dec 2.
PMID: 41344632

Wildfire-specific fine particulate matter and preterm birth: a US ECHO Cohort analysis.
Sherris AR, Dearborn LC, Goin DE, Loftus CT, Szpiro AA, Casey JA, Ilango SD, Angal J, Bennett DH, Buxton MA, Camargo CA Jr, Carroll KN, Childs ML, Cioffi C, Croen LA, Dabelea D, Eick SM, Farzan SF, Ferrara A, Garcia E, Gemmill A, Gilliland F, Habre R, Hertz-Picciotto I, Hipwell AE, Hirtz D, Karagas MR, Koinis-Mitchell D, Kress AM, Leve LD, Liang D, Lyall K, McCormack LA, McEvoy CT, Mirzakhani H, Morello-Frosch R, Niu Z, O'Connor TG, Peterson AK, Schmidt RJ, Karr CJ, Padula AM, ECHO Cohort Consortium
Lancet Planet Health. 2025 Dec;9(12):101324. doi: 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101324. Epub 2025 Nov 3.
PMID: 41197644

Prenatal exposure to environmental phenolic compounds and their association with childhood atopic dermatitis, asthma, and allergic rhinitis in the ECHO cohort.
Miller RL, Wang Y, Aalborg J, Alshawabkeh AN, Braun JM, Breton CV, Carignan CC, Dabelea D, Dunlop AL, Ferrara A, Gao G, Gaylord A, Geiger SD, Gold DR, Abul MH, Hartert TV, Herbstman J, Hoepner LA, Karagas MR, Karr CJ, Kelly RS, Khatchikian CE, Liu M, Lyall K, Meeker JD, Morello-Frosch R, O'Connor TG, Oh J, Sathyanarayana S, Sordillo JE, Trasande L, Woodruff TJ, ECHO Cohort Consortium
Environ Int. 2025 Nov;205:109883. doi: 10.1016/j.envint.2025.109883. Epub 2025 Oct 24.
PMID: 41161078

Changes to Family Life, Youth COVID-19 Pandemic-Related Traumatic Stress, and the Youth Mental Health Crisis.
Margolis AE, Law A, Knapp EA, Greenwood P, Algermissen M, Avalos LA, Birnhak Z, Blackwell C, Breton C, Bush NR, Duarte C, Frazier J, Ganiban J, Herbstman J, Hernandez I, Hofheimer JA, Karagas MR, Pagliaccio D, Ramphal B, Cohen JW, Roubinov D, Saxbe D, Schmidt R, Sherlock P, Velez-Vega C, Tang X, Rauh V, Lewis J, Hamra G, Bastain TM
J Clin Child Adolesc Psychol. 2025 Oct 17;:1-16. doi: 10.1080/15374416.2025.2556658. Epub 2025 Oct 17.
PMID: 41105920

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