Healthy aging

Two graduate students received the 2026-2027 UWRA Patricia Doughterty Fellowships in Aging. Congratulations to Dr. Augusto Ferraris and Dr. Xinmei Huang for their demonstrated academic and personal interest in aging-related issues or concerns. 

“Research on aging is essential to the well-being of our communities,” said Graduate School Dean Joy Williamson-Lott. “Augusto and Xinmei exemplify the kind of scholarship that not only advances knowledge, but also responds to the real needs of an aging population. Their work reflects both intellectual rigor and deep personal commitment.” 

Augusto Ferraris 

Ferraris is a physician and epidemiologist whose work centers on medication safety and dementia prevention in older adults. 

Originally from Argentina, Ferraris completed his medical degree in Buenos Aires and later trained in internal medicine at the Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires, one of the leading hospitals in Argentina and Latin America. His interest in dementia prevention stemmed from caring for his grandmother who experienced cognitive decline as an older adult. “I took care of her during her disease, and that was a big inspiration to pursue this path,” says Ferraris. 

Ferraris began his research career studying medication effects in older adults, contributing to projects on the safety of antipsychotic medications and their associations with adverse outcomes. Ferraris came to the University of Washington for his master’s degree through the support of the Fulbright Scholarship.  

His doctoral dissertation evaluates the cognitive effects of gabapentin, a medication used to treat pain and seizures, using data from the Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) study, a long-running cohort focused on dementia risk factors.  

The goal is to provide clinicians and patients with clearer evidence about the long-term cognitive implications of widely prescribed medications. “It’s a privilege and I’m grateful to the association for their support and seeing value in our research,” Ferraris says, “I’m also grateful to the participants from these studies– the families and their caregivers. It’s important to recognize them as they are a central part of the research.” Ferraris envisions a career dedicated to improving the health and well-being of aging populations through rigorous, actionable epidemiologic research with a patient-centered approach. 

Xinmei Huang 

Huang is a fourth-year Ph.D. student in the Department of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences (DEOHS) whose work focuses on long-term air pollution exposure and how air pollution impacts neurocognitive aging and dementia. 

Huang is originally from China and completed her master’s degree at ETH Zürich, Switzerland. While completing her master’s thesis on air pollution and cause-specific mortality, she reached out to her current mentor at UW, Dr. Joel D. Kaufman, and expressed interest in further developing her academic training in environmental health by exploring how air pollution is linked to human health outcomes. “His research focused on exposure assessment and environmental epidemiology, particularly on the effects of air pollution on chronic health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease and dementia. That perfectly matched my research interests, and I was very pleased to be offered a Ph.D. position at UW DEOHS to work with Dr. Kaufman,” says Huang. 

Along with her interest in research, Huang’s grandmother suffers from mild cognitive impairment, giving her a personal interest in gaining more understanding of the disease and environmental factors that may contribute to it.  “Most people don’t consider how environmental exposure can impact neurocognitive aging and dementia, and I wanted to express how important it actually is,” says Huang. 

One of Huang’s main goals with her research is to raise awareness of how environments can impact people’s health and how collective actions, including policy changes, as well as personal choices, can reduce harmful exposures to protect long-term health.  

This wasn’t Huang’s first time applying for the fellowship. She applied last year and was rejected but reevaluated her application materials and became a recipient this year. “I am so grateful to receive this award as it allows me more opportunities to focus on my research and connect more with the UWRA community,” says Huang. 

 Congratulations to both awardees. For more information about the fellowship and how to apply, please visit the UWRA website for next year’s application cycle. 

 

By Tatiana Rodriguez, UW Graduate School

Published on April 27, 2026