About the Child Health and Development Institute

The Child Health and Development Institute (CHDI) is a translational research enterprise with the mission of advancing knowledge and therapies for diseases affecting infants, children, and adolescents. Led by Bruce D. Gelb, MD, the CHDI provides an intellectually rich and supportive environment for fostering collaborative scientific investigation and Mount Sinai’s “bench to bedside” philosophy, as well as training the next generation of scientific leaders in pediatric medicine.

Physician-scientists and scientists at the CHDI work in a multidisciplinary manner with researchers and physicians in various departments and institutes at Mount Sinai. Together, we strive toward the objectives of developing robust paradigms for understanding the effects of genetics and environment on the health of infants, children and adolescents, and personalizing pediatric medicine through genetics and genomics.

Unparalleled Expertise at Mount Sinai

Mount Sinai carries a longstanding tradition of clinical and research innovation and accomplishments. The CHDI builds upon existing strengths which span several departments, institutes, and research programs, in order to leverage resources and accelerate achievement. Specifically, Mount Sinai created one of the nation's first Department of Pediatrics that garners top 20 funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other extramural granting agencies.

Additionally, Mount Sinai is a global leader in the study of genetic underpinnings of human disease and was one of the first two sites to begin the implementation of the National Children’s Study. This epidemiological investigation involves the tracking of 100,000 American children from conception to age 12 to discover the environmental factors that promote health, as well as those that contribute to pediatric diseases. Other areas of Mount Sinai’s widely recognized pediatric research and treatment expertise encompass allergy and asthma, the genetics of congenital heart defects, neurodevelopmental disorders, and childhood obesity and diabetes.

Strategic Partnerships for Advancing Child Health

The CHDI collaborates extensively with various institutional partners. We work closely with Mount Sinai's Departments of Pediatrics, Genetics and Genomics Sciences, Preventative Medicine, Psychiatry, Developmental and Regenerative Biology, and Gene and Cell Medicine, as well as other hospitals and organizations nationwide. Additionally, we coordinate research efforts with other translational institutes at Mount Sinai, including the Genomics Institute, Charles R. Bronfman Institute for Personalized Medicine, Black Family Stem Cell Institute, the Friedman Brain Institute, as well as the Immunology and Metabolism Institutes. We also partner with key clinical and research centers: the Jaffe Food Allergy Institute, the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, the Children's Heart Center, the Hall Family Center for Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes, and the Adolescent Health Center.

Research

Recent technologic advances, particularly for DNA sequencing, have brought clinicians and scientists to a breathtaking juncture, as it is now possible to sequence all of the protein-encoding portions of the human genome in a matter of days. Significant genomic strides such as this bring about remarkable translational research possibilities. Leveraging genetics and genomics data and the surrounding diverse population in New York City, the CHDI's research initiatives focus on four major areas of investigation:

• Asthma and allergy
• Cardiovascular disease
• Neurodevelopment disorders
• Obesity and Diabetes

Through various explorations of disease pathogenesis, such as the National Children's Study, the CHDI aims to maximize the use of genetic information to improve the health of children. We are strongly committed to expanding the scientific infrastructure for genomic technology and developing new personalizing pediatric therapies, not only to maximize efficacy and reduce side effects, but also to improve diagnostic accuracy and outcome predictions.