Get to know us

Meet the Team

Dr. Hailey banack


Principal Investigator, The Aging Epi Research Group
Assistant Professor, Epidemiology Division, Dalla Lana School of Public Health

Novo Nordisk Professor in Health Equity and Chronic Disease Prevention

Claire Cook


PhD Student, Epidemiology
Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto


Claire is a PhD Candidate in the Epidemiology Division at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto. Claire’s work aims to understand how sex- and age- specific reproductive health factors contribute to cardiometabolic disease burden and healthy aging among postmenopausal women. Her thesis is titled “From menarche to menopause: examining the impact of reproductive health history on obesity and diabetes among postmenopausal women in the United States.” Claire completed her Bachelor of Music at McGill University where she studied music history and her Master of Public Health at the University of Rochester where she completed her master’s thesis in maternal and child health. She then worked as a research assistant on a clinical trial for patients with Metabolic Syndrome before spending several years as a clinical research coordinator at Massachusetts General Hospital managing clinical epidemiology projects in rheumatology and COVID-19. Claire’s doctoral work is supported by the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.

Chris Kim


PhD Student, Epidemiology
Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto


Chris Kim is a PhD Candidate in Epidemiology at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto. Prior to joining the PhD program, Chris worked in clinical research for several years at hospitals and contract research organizations. He majored in mathematics in undergrad at McGill University and also completed his Master of Public Health in epidemiology at U of T. His research interests include obesity, sarcopenic obesity, cardiometabolic outcomes, and machine learning. His thesis topic concerns the fat mass to fat-free mass ratio as a measure of sarcopenic obesity.

Ms. LILAC/MASS Study Team


The study team for Ms. LILAC and MASS are responsible for the primary data collection required for these NIH-funded research projects


Members: Mallory Ziegler, Lily Engebrecht, Hannah Voit, Shelby Sailer, Allison Panaro, and Nina Parry