The CIRCLE team comprises a diverse group of investigators from five premier research institutions: the University of California, Berkeley; The University of California, San Francisco; University of Southern California; Yale University; and Stanford University.  Team members have specialties in a wide variety of disciplines including epidemiology, analytical chemistry, community outreach, exposure biology, clinical oncology, statistics, research translation, and pathology.  The CIRCLE research team aims to bring all of that expertise to bear on identifying the causes of childhood leukemia. Since 2008, we have been working to discover how environmental and genetic risk factors interact to cause the disease with the goal of preventing more children from getting sick. You can learn about a few of our investigators by following the links below and learn about all of our team members here.

Dr. Catherine Metayer is an Adjunct Professor at the University of California, Berkeley in the School of Public Health and the Director of CIRCLE. She began her career as a resident in oncology and pediatrics working in the hospitals of the Bordeaux region of France; but, then, she started it over as an epidemiologist to find out what causes children to get cancer. Read more of her story.

Dr. Joe Wiemels is a Professor of Preventive Medicine at University of Southern California and a CIRCLE Project Leader. He’s on a quest to uncover the biological mechanisms underpinning childhood leukemia – drilling down to the molecular level to understand how our genes work and what cause children to get cancer. Read more of his story.

Dr. Todd Whitehead is an Assistant Researcher at the University of California, Berkeley in the School of Public Health and the Career Development Investigator of CIRCLE. His research is focused on assessing children’s exposures to toxins by measuring persistent chemicals in settled dust collected from their homes. So, now, whenever he’s vacuuming his own carpets, he can’t help but think about all of the hazards that are lurking deep within the fibers. Read more of his story.