Lei Cao

Dr. Lei Cao is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Ottawa. Her research focuses on how environmental stressors, particularly those induced by natural disasters, influence developmental trajectories and health outcomes through genomic and epigenomic mechanisms. She investigates vulnerable populations, including pregnant women, children, and adolescents, exploring the long-term effects of stress on mental and physical health.

Dr. Cao holds a PhD from the Public Research Centre (Luxembourg) and University of Trier (Germany), an MSc from Université Henri-Poincaré and Institut National Polytechnique de Lorraine (France), and completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at McGill University. Her work bridges epigenetics, developmental biology, and public health, with a focus on prenatal stress, DNA methylation, and the developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD).

Her research highlights the role of epigenetic modifications in mediating stress effects, such as links between maternal anxiety during pregnancy and children’s behavioral outcomes, and how prenatal exposure to disasters impacts BMI, hippocampal volumes, and immune function. She collaborates on large-scale studies like Project Ice Storm, examining gene-environment interactions in disaster-affected cohorts.

• Key Research Themes: Stress and natural disasters, genetics/epigenetics, developmental origins of health and disease.
• Publications: 11 peer-reviewed articles since 2015, focusing on prenatal stress, DNA methylation, and disaster-related health impacts.