COVID-19 Research at USC

Below is a list of COVID-19 research conducted by USC researchers. This page is a resource for USC Communications, USC leadership, USC alumni, and parties outside of USC.

If you are doing any COVID-19 related research at USC, we’d love to feature you! Please fill out our COVID-19 Research Form to be added below.

USC Research and Innovation (R&I)-Funded Research

USC Research and Innovation (R&I) is proud to support many excellent COVID-19 research efforts.

The following are COVID-19 research projects funded by the USC Research and Innovation (R&I), Office of the Provost, the Academic Senate, the Ming Hsieh Institute, and USC Stevens.

Therapeutic targeting of SARS-CoV-2 main protease with ultrastable microproteins
Julio A. Camarero, Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Mann School of Pharmacy
Xiaojiang Chen, Chemistry, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences
Pinghui Feng, Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Keck School of Medicine of USC

Structural basis of SARS-CoV-2 entry in the host cell
Vadim Cherezov, Chemistry, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Deactivation of Airborne and Surface-Borne Viruses using Nanosecond Pulsed Plasmas
Stephen Cronin, Electrical Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering
Pin Wang, Biomedical Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering

SARS-Cov-2 Antibody Testing in Vulnerable Communities
Jason Doctor, Schaeffer Center for Health Economics and Policy, Sol Price School of Public Policy
Neeraj Sood, Sol Price School of Public Policy
Michael Hochman, USC Gehr Family Center for Health Systems Science & Innovation, Keck School of Medicine of USC

COVID-19 and the Continuity of Health Services in Kenya: A Multidisciplinary Exploration of the Potential Role of Self-Care Interventions and Community Health Workers
Laura Ferguson, Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine School of Medicine

Vulnerability to the psychosocial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic: The role of child maltreatment and DNA methylation
Daniel Hackman, USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, School of Social Work
Ferol Mennen, School of Social Work
Joshua Millstein, Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC
Daniel Weisenberger, Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC

Integrated Modeling of Healthcare Capacity and Patient Needs to Intervene Against Human Transmitted Viral Disease
Randolph Hall, Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering

Measuring the Internet During COVID-19 to Evaluate Quarantine
John Heidemann, Information Sciences Institute / Computer Science Dept, Viterbi School of Engineering

Effects of psycholinguistic variations on persuasiveness of COVID-19 health messages
Elsi Kaiser, Linguistics, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Jennifer Unger, Institute for Health Promotion & Disease Prevention, Keck School of Medicine of USC

Prevention and Treatment of COVID-19 Induced Pneumonia by Stimulating the Protective Arm of Angiotensin System
Vsevolod Katritch, The Bridge@USC, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Stan Louie, Clinical Pharmacy, Mann School of Pharmacy
Vadim Cherezov, Chemistry, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences

Gemini – A digital twin for data-driven modeling, policy planning and decision making at the University of Southern California
Bhaskar Krishnamachari, Electrical Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering

Development and implementation of a novel mobile application to assess COVID-19 symptoms and facilitate geospatial activity mapping for managing disease surveillance and containment
Peter Kuhn, Convergent Science Institute in Cancer, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Cyrus Shahabi, Computer Science, Viterbi School of Engineering

Engaging Diverse Communities in COVID-19 Control: A Value-Based Measure of Health-Safety Climate for Decision Making
Michalle Mor Barak, USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, School of Social Work
Charles Kaplan, School of Social Work
Arie Kapteyn, Economics, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences
Shinyi Wu, School of Social Work

The health and wellbeing of the health care professionals during the COVID-19 crisis: A multidisciplinary focus combining human-centric AI and biobehavioral sensing
Shrikanth Narayanan, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering
Kristina Lerman, Information Sciences Institute, Viterbi School of Engineering
Emilio Ferrara, Information Sciences Institute, Viterbi School of Engineering
Gayla Margolin, Psychology, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences
Eric Hsieh, Medicine – GIM – PAT.Care – Clin Fac, Keck School of Medicine of USC

Protein Production to Support COVID-19 Research at USC
Richard Roberts, Chemistry, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Pregnancy During a Pandemic: Effects on Prenatal Stress, Social Support, and Maternal-Infant Health Outcomes
Darby Saxbe, Psychology, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Identifying Priority Testing Locations in Southern California for COVID-19 With Transmission Dynamics and Network Data
Sze-chuan Suen, Industrial and Systems Engineering, Viterbi School of Engineering
Maged Dessouky, ISE, Viterbi School of Engineering
Neeraj Sood, Public Policy, Sol Price School of Public Policy

Data-Driven Modeling of Viral Dynamics in Covid-19 Patients
Satish Thittamaranahalli, Information Sciences Institute, Viterbi School of Engineering
Rajiv Kalia, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences

A policy scan for addressing COVID-19 disparities: An overview of policies and legislation focused on the impact of COVID-19 on vulnerable populations
Reginald Tucker-Seeley, Gerontology, Davis School of Gerontology
Kathleen Wilber, Gerontology, Davis School of Gerontology

Addressing Ethical Dilemmas during the COVID-19 Pandemic through AI
Phebe Vayanos, Industrial & Systems Engineering and Computer Science, Viterbi School of Engineering

Efficient Antiviral Discovery via Covalently Targeting SARS-CoV-2 Main Protease
Chao Zhang, Division of Biology, Davis School of Gerontology
Arieh Warshel, Chemistry, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences
Pinghui Feng, Section of Infection and Immunity, Ostrow School of Dentistry

Combating COVID-19 with Novel Vaccines
Yong Zhang, Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences/Faculty, Mann School of Pharmacy
Heinz-Josef Lenz, Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC
Alan Epstein, Pathology, Keck School of Medicine of USC

Keck School-Funded Research

Please visit Keck School of Medicine of USC for a list of their COVID-19 research.

Tools & Resources

Tools and resources created to help fight against COVID-19.

Maria P. Aranda; Iris Aguilar
Examining the impact of COVID-19 on aging service agencies across Los Angeles County by conducting open-ended key informant interviews with directors and managers of these agencies.

Andrea Armani 
EAGER: COVID-19 Modular Disinfection System based on Ultraviolet Irradiation.

François Bar 
Piloting a grassroots campaign with a community partner to co-design and deploy handwashing stations on Skid Row. Details at handwashing.

Wandi Bruine de Bruin 
Advisory Services for Covid-19 Response Efforts

Richard Dang 
|Appointed Chair of of the COVID-19 Taskforce for the California Pharmacists Association with the charge to respond to the coronavirus situation and its impact on the profession of pharmacy and patient care services in California.

Children’s Data Network
The USC Children’s Data Network is honored to have played a significant role in the rapid development and operation of mychildcare.ca.gov, a searchable, web-based interface that connects essential workers across the state of California to quickly find timely, accurate information about the availability of local, licensed child care slots. Learn more here.

Dominique Duncan 
Developing a multimodal COVID-19 data archive (COVID-ARC).

Dominique Duncan 
RAPID: COVID-ARC (COVID-19 Data Archive) Research Experience for Teachers Supplement

Juan Espinoza; Kelly Crown; Omkar Kulkarni; James Dickhoner
Developed a chatbot on the CHLA website for patients to check their own symptoms and advise on whether they should come in for a scheduled appointment or convert appointment to a phone or telehealth visit.

Mehdi Ghayoumi 
Creating an app about COVID-19 to provide info and estimate probability of COVID-19 symptoms.

Ali Gholamrezanezhad; Vinay Duddalwar; Bhushan Desai; Bino Varghese; Darryl Hwang; Steven Yong Cen 
Creating a COVID-19 imaging data repository.

Kyle Hurth; Sue Ellen Martin 
The USC Immunohistochemistry Laboratory has the ability to offer interested researchers the ability to perform RNA scope in-situ hybridization (ISH) testing of tissue for a variety of COVID-19 SARS-CoV-2 and related human targets.

Gabriel Kahn 
CLEF COVID-19 Response Fund Application

Robinder Khemani; Christopher Newth; Randall Wetzel; Juan Espinoza 
Developed E-ventilator, a decision support system to help manage mechanical ventilators, implementing evidence based protocols validated in adults with ARDS.

Mitul Luhar; Christoph Efstathiou
Developing 3-D printed prototypes for test swab.

Jonathan May; Shri Narayanan; Emilio Ferrara; Ulf Hermjakob 
Detecting active situations and needs reported in social media across the globe in many languages for first responders and decision makers to quickly identify hot spots and better allocate resources.

Antonio Ortega; Benjamin Girault 
Working with an international team to develop and deploy open CoronaSurveys and related analytical tools to track the evolution of confirmed and suspected cases over time.

Manuel Pastor; Justin Scoggins 
COVID-19 and the Crisis: Vulnerabilities in Los Angeles is an analysis and slide deck created for community partners to demonstrate how certain vulnerable populations in Los Angeles are particularly threatened.

Manuel Pastor 
Roadmap to Recovery: Collaborating with UCLA Luskin to lift up issues of vulnerable communities and prepare a roadmap that leaders can use to ensure populations and communities in Los Angeles County most impacted by COVID-19 are not left behind.

Minnie Prince
CPB – COVID 19 Stabilization Funds

Jay Pujara; Kristina LermanFred Morstatter; Xiang Ren 
AI models for scoring scientific research on COVID-19 based on reliability and impact.

Jay Pujara; Gerard Hoberg; Craig Knoblock 
RAPID: Supply Chain Portal to Serve Entrepreneurs Producing Critical Items in Response to COVID-19 (SupCovid).

Richard Roberts 
Protein Production to Support COVID-19 Research at USC

Andrzej Rutkowski 
An ongoing archive of Twitter data associated with the coronavirus as well as resources to help you use it for research. Link to site.

Amy Ryan 
Providing a variety of lung cells (adult, fetal, stem) to study effects of virus.

Sonali Saluja
Sue Kim
Funded by the California Health Care Foundation to develop and implement Partners in Vaccination, training community-based care managers at Partners in Care Foundation to address concerns about the COVID-19 vaccine for low-income, medically complex individuals living in the community.

Neeraj Sood 
COVID-19 Digital Contact Tracing and Sensing Tools for Health Departments: Development, Implementation, and Ethics Research

Pedro Szekely; Jay Pujara; Hans Chalupsky; Filip Ilievski 
Knowledge graph of coronavirus scientific literature, including entity, relation and event annotations extracted using machine reading software and augmentation from various bioinformatics databases.

Matthew Wiepking; Jonathan Chow; Michael T. McCurdy
Entering clinical data into The University of Maryland School of Medicine’s IRB-approved multi-center registry examining the use of vasopressors in COVID-19 associated shock. Additional details found here.

Bassam Yaghmour; George Yaghmour; Tarek Khedro; Giridharan Ramsingh
Review article providing an extensive summary of most recent reports and studies since the initial outbreak and the most up-to-date understanding of of COVID-19 for the American Journal of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology.

Basic Research

Basic research and studies at USC related to COVID-19.

Omid Akbari; Pedram S Jahani; Georges Helou 
Characterized the lung immune cells for COVID-19 and are now measuring human serum to establish immunity.

Omid Akbari 
Study the immune landscape of patients with COVID-19.

Houda Alachkar; Serghei Mangul; Bassam Yaghmour; George Yaghmour; Emi Minejima; Annie Wong-Beringer 
Study of T Cell Repertoire Changes in SARS-COV-2 (COVID-19) Infected Subjects

Alexandre Bonnin; Thea Tagliaferro; Qiuying Zhao; Saloni Walia; Sue Martin 
Effects of maternal COVID-19 infection on blood placenta barrier integrity.

Michael Bowdish;  Zea Borok; Adupa P Rao;  Perren Cobb; Meghan Lewis;  John Alexander-Dam 
Studying stem cells and exosomes for moderate-severe COVID-19 respiratory distress syndrome.

Paula Cannon 
Providing non-infectious models of viral entry into cells for antibody screening.

Vadim Cherezov 
Structural basis of SARS-CoV-2 entry in the host cell

Edward Crandall; Kwang Jin Kim; Arnold Sipos; Wei Ming Yuan
Studying exposure to COVID-19 proteins on lung cell function.

Stephen Cronin; Pin Wang 
Deactivation of Airborne and Surface-Borne Viruses using Nanosecond Pulsed Plasmas

Francesco Cutrale 
Mapping SARS-CoV-2-induced metabolic changes in lung alveolar epithelial cells and macrophages

Senta Georgia 
Understanding the role of COVID19 in insulin cell dysfunction and the pathogenesis of diabetes

Young-Kwon Hong; Dongwon Choi
Identifying and characterizing how COVID-19 enters human host cells.

Young-Kwon Hong 
CEACAM proteins as New Cellular Receptors for SARS-Cov-2

Jae U Jung 
Clinical outcomes, viral shedding and development of immune responses in mother-infant pairs affected by COVID-19.

Catherine Kuza; J. Perren Cobb; Aarya Kafi; Keith Killu; Santhi Kumar; May Lee
Delirium in critically ill patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Hayoun Lee 
Adapting sequence-based HIV platform for phylogenetic analysis of COVID-19 virus.

Hayoun Lee 
SARS-CoV-2 whole genome sequencing and transmission cluster identification for COVID-19 genomic surveillance

Chengyu Liang 
Studying mechanisms of virus entry and egress to identify new methods for virus prevention via blocking transmission.

Keigo Machida 
Studying inhibition of COVID virus receptors for drug treatments.

Suraiya Rasheed; Zea Borok 
Identification of specific COVID-19 mutations at different stages of lung disease.

Suraiya Rasheed; William Guaderman; Eric Kawaguchi; Neha Nanda 
Classification of COVID-19 viral genome sequences in relation to disease severity.

Sita Reddy; Lucio Comai 
Developed a pipeline to monitor genome-wide translation in live cells to, aiding the study of interactions between the virus and its human host.

Richard Roberts; Terry Takahashi 
Constructing SARS virus proteins, developing high affinity binding reagents to these proteins, and deploying these reagents in serological assays to measure both viral proteins in biological fluids and the host antibody responses to infections. More here and here.

Bodour Salhia; Parkash Gill; Heinz-Josef Lenz; Ann Hamilton; Juan Pablo Lewinger 
Identifying molecular markers of severe outcome susceptibility for COVID-19.

Satish Thittamaranahalli; Rajiv Kalia 
Data-Driven Modeling of Viral Dynamics in Covid-19 Patients

Marc Vermulst 
RAPID: Probing SARS-CoV-2 evolution and vulnerabilities through its mutation and fitness landscape

Rongfu Wang 
Immune response and regulatory mechanisms in COVID-19

Annie Wong-Beringer; Emi Minejima; Corey Kelsom 
Studying secondary bacterial infections in patients hospitalized for COVID-19.

Weiming Yuan 
Identifying SARS-CoV-2 virus genes responsible for disregulating human immune responses.

Weiming Yuan 
Suppression of NKT cell function by SARS-CoV-2 virus

Chao Zhang 
Discovering inhibitors of coronavirus protein.

Chao Zhang; Arieh Warshel; Pinghui Feng 
Efficient Antiviral Discovery via Covalently Targeting SARS-CoV-2 Main Protease

Animal Models

Research at USC using animal models to study COVID-19.

Pinghui Feng 
Interaction between SARS-CoV-2 and a herpesvirus in a mouse model.

Jae U Jung 
Recently published the first study to show animal model for SARS-CoV-2 that reproduces human COVID-19 infection and transmission. This animal model is key for drug and vaccine development.

Valter Longo 
Studying mouse fasting and fasting-mimicking diets (FMD) for improving immune system function in the elderly without causing detrimental side effects and increasing vaccination efficacy.

Charles McKenna 
Generating and Testing Small Molecule Inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2; Developing an Animal Model for In Vivo Testing

J.-H. James Ou 
Studying host cell response to COVID-19 and establishing mouse models for studying the pathogenesis.

Clinical Trials

Research at USC for COVID-19 that is undergoing clinical trials.

Subarna Biswas 
A Multicenter, Prospective, Randomized, Open-Label Phase 2 Study to Assess Safety and Efficacy of Ang-3777 in Patients Hospitalized With Confirmed COVID-19 Pneumonia.

Michael Bowdish; Zea Borok; Perren Cobb 
A Multicenter, double blind, parallel design, placebo controlled trial to Assess Safety and Efficacy of Mesenchymal stem cells for the treatment of moderate to severe COVID-19 acute respiratory distress syndrome.

Richard J. Castriotta; Aarya Kafi; Lynn Fukushima
A multicenter, double-blind, randomized controlled trial of a new antiviral drug for COVID-19.

Michael Dube 
A5395: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial to Evaluate the Efficacy of Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin to Prevent Hospitalization or Death in Persons with COVID-19.

Michael Dube; Heinz-Josef Lenz 
Phase II study of anti-inflammatory/antiviral therapy in moderate-severe pre-ventilator COVID-19.

Luanda Grazette 
Multicenter, Randomized-Controlled Trial to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of Antithrombotic Therapy for Prevention of Arterial and Venous Thrombotic Complications in Critically Ill COVID-19 Patients

Julie Lang; Kashif Khan; Zea Borok; Perren Cobb 
The I-SPY COVID TRIAL is a platform trial providing access to investigational agents for critically ill patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 who have severe or life-threatening COVID-19. The primary endpoint will be time to reach COVID level 4 or less. More here.

Heinz-Josef Lenz 
An open-label, pilot study followed by a randomized phase II trial of antiviral therapy combined with baricitinib or antivirals alone in moderate and severe patients with COVID-19.

Meghan Lewis 
A Phase 3, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Study of Lenzilumab in Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19 Pneumonia.

Caroline Piatek 
A Phase 3 Open-label, Randomized, Controlled Study to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of Intravenously Administered Ravulizumab Compared with Best Supportive Care in Patients with COVID-19 Severe Pneumonia, Acute Lung Injury, or Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome.

Adupa P Rao 
A phase 3 randomized placebo controlled study to examine the efficacy and safety of DAS181 for the treatment of lower respiratory tract parainfluenza infection in the immunocompromised subjects.

Michael E. Selsted; Andre J. Ouellette; Paul M. Beringer; A. Purush Rao; William Stohl 
Developing peptide treatment for COVID-19 pneumonia. Completed Phase 1 PK and safety studies.

Norah Terrault 
A Phase II, Open-Label, Randomized, Multicenter Study to Investigate the Pharmacodynamics, Pharmacokinetics, Safety, and Efficacy of 8 MG/KG or 4 MG/KG Intravenous Tocilizumab in Patients With Moderate to Severe COVID-19 Pneumonia

Testing Research

Research at USC on testing for COVID-19.

Nathaniel Bottman 
RAPID: Optimizing group testing for SARS-CoV-2

Jason DoctorNeeraj SoodMichael Hochman 
SARS-Cov-2 Antibody Testing in Vulnerable Communities

Kimon Drakopoulos; Ramandeep Randhawa 
Studying the trade-off between increasing testing accuracy vs improving testing availability. See a 2-min video of research.

Michael Dube
Pooled and conventional nucleic acid testing strategies for SARS-CoV-2 to screen direct care research staff

Andrea Kovacs; Olivier Pernet;  Toni Frederick; Eva Operskalski; Allison Bearden 
Developing antibody testing from self-collected saliva, oral swabs blood, urine and GI samples. Also supporting clinical trials of emerging therapeutics by providing virologic testing.

Peter Kuhn 
Developing novel application of the highly portable Nanopore Minion cartridge-based sequencing system for remote diagnostic COVID-19 testing.

Peter Kuhn; Cyrus Shahabi 
Development and implementation of a novel mobile application to assess COVID-19 symptoms and facilitate geospatial activity mapping for managing disease surveillance and containment

Adam Smith 
RAPID: Monitoring for SARS-CoV-2 in municipal wastewater and sewage to elucidate infection dynamics across major metropolitan areas of the United States

Brad Spellberg 
Working on COVID testing in the population.

Bino Varghese 
Artificial intelligence based chest x-ray instant triage product to identify COVID 19, community acquired pneumonias in community and hospital settings

Pre-Clinical Therapeutics, Drug/Vaccine Research

Research at USC to find new treatments for COVID-19.

Paul Bogdan; Zikun Yang; Shahin Nazarian 
Exploiting in silico immuno-informatics, we develop an AI framework to predict and select the best vaccine subunits and construct a multi-epitope vaccine for emerging SARS-CoV-2 virus. Learn more.

Michael Bowdish 
Network for Cardiothoracic Surgical Investigations in Cardiovascular Medicine: Mesenchymal Stem Cells for the Treatment of Moderate to Severe COVID-19 Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome

Julio A. Camarero; Xiaojiang Chen; Pinghui Feng 
Therapeutic targeting of SARS-CoV-2 main protease with ultrastable microproteins

Preet Chaudhary 
Off-the-shelf cellular immunotherapy for COVID-19

Siyi Chen 
Development of mucosal COVID-19 vaccines

Ya-Wen Chen 
Blocking COVID-19 from entering into lung cells and providing lung cells and organoids for developing drugs for preventing COVID-19 transmission and cytokine storm.

Ya-Wen Chen 
Development of TMPRSS2 antibody as an antiviral treatment for SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19).

Ya-Wen Chen 
Non-clinical development of monothiol human thioredoxin-1 (ORP100S) as an inhaled treatment for COVID-19 respiratory disease.

Lucio Comai; Sita Reddy; Kyung W. Jung 
Identified a library of drug-like compounds to facilitate degradation or inhibit translation of the SARS-CoV-2 RNA genome.

Denis Evseenko 
Developing novel small molecule immunomodulators to inhibit cytokine storm and lung damage in COVID-19 and similar infections.

Pinghui Feng; Chao Zhang; Lucio Comai; Sita Reddy; Nicholas Graham
Developing antiviral molecules against COVID-19.

Justin Ichida 
Development of a host PIKFYVE kinase inhibitor for the treatment of COVID-19.

Cheng Ji 
Investigating side effects of antiviral drugs and minimizing them.

Vsevolod Katritch; Stan Louie; Vadim Cherezov 
Prevention and Treatment of COVID-19 Induced Pneumonia by Stimulating the Protective Arm of Angiotensin System

Stan Louie 
Evaluation of Telmisartan for COVID-19 Disease

Keigo Machida 
Drug to reduce SARS-CoV-2-related disease severity induced by alcohol and tobacco

Keigo Machida 
Targeting RNA methyltransferase and entry to derepress anti-SARS-CoV-2 defense

Charles McKenna 
Repurposing potent antiviral agents for COVID-19.

Ann Mohrbacher 
Dasatinib for the treatment of patients with moderate to severe SARS-CoV2 (COVID-19)

Richard Roberts; Terry Takahashi 
Developing peptide and protein reagents for COVID-19 serological testing and therapeutics.

Pin Wang 
Creating live hybrid viruses toward an effective COVID-19 vaccine.

Yong Zhang; Heinz-Josef Lenz; Alan Epstein 
Combating COVID-19 with Novel Vaccines.

Demographic and Epidemiologic Research

COVID-19 studies at USC based on demographics.

Keith Burghardt 
Collecting real-time data on migration patterns and developing migration-based interventions to reduce COVID-19 spread. Also data on economic impact of COVID-19 on businesses and how it correlates with growth of the disease.

Zhanghua Chen 
The impact of air pollution exposure on COVID-19 severity and mortality.

Yao-Yi Chiang; Yijun Lin 
Looking at how various COVID-19 related policies and major events affect air quality in micro neighborhoods in Los Angeles.

David Conti; Abigail Horn; Wendy Cozen 
Modeling the impact of COVID-19: cases, bed capacity, ventilators, mortality based on risk factors. Learn more here.

Yolanda Gil; Daniel Garijo 
Using AI to describe and integrate models and data in many domains, in the case of COVID-19 we work with epidemiology models that simulate disease spread and have diverse applicability and data needs.

Frank Gilliland; Jennifer Unger; Howard Hu 
The COVID-19 Pandemic Research Center promotes translational research using multidisciplinary approaches to understand and mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on the health of populations in Los Angeles, California and beyond, especially those experiencing health inequities. Learn more here.

Frank Gilliland 
Studying COVID-19 infection and pandemic impacts on the individual and family level in two existing cohorts.

Frank Gilliland 
COVID-19 Impacts on Birth Weight and Children’s Growth Trajectories.

Christopher Haiman 
Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic among prostate cancer patients

Randolph Hall 
Integrated Modeling of Healthcare Capacity and Patient Needs to Intervene Against Human Transmitted Viral Disease. Learn more here.

Kayla de la Haye 
RAPID: Tracking COVID-19 Related Impacts on the Food System and Food Access in Los Angeles County.

John Heidemann 
Measuring the Internet During COVID-19 to Evaluate Quarantine

Arie Kapteyn; Jill Darling; Kyla Thomas; Daniel Bennett 
Understanding America Study Health Tracking Poll on COVID-19. Baseline survey was fielded in March and weekly or bi weekly surveys will follow respondents over time. Learn more here.

Arie Kapteyn 
COVID-19: US Data Collection for Household Response and Impact Monitoring.

Michele Kipke 
Studying COVID-19 infection, symptoms, severity, and co-morbidity in Latino and African American young adults.

Bhaskar Krishnamachari 
Gemini – A digital twin for data-driven modeling, policy planning and decision making at the University of Southern California.

Bhaskar Krishnamachari 
Developing and evaluating algorithms and applications for privacy-sensitive mobile Bluetooth-based digital contact tracing, monitoring, predictive analytics, and policy decision-making efforts.

Chun Nok Jonathan Lam; Sarah Axeen; Sophie Terp; Elizabeth Burner; Daniel Dworkis; Sanjay Arora; Michael Menchine 
Characterize the effect of COVID-19 and social distancing measures on urban public emergency department visits, patient disposition, and diagnosis-mix of visits as compared to prior years.

Trevor Lane; Bruce Elliot; Jason Solema 
A study of the economic impact of COVID-19 on tribal and rural communities. We intend to generate research findings that improve indigenous economic resilience, workforce development, and indigenous methodologies; specifically to empower tribal and historically underrepresented communities.

Kristina Lerman; Yigal Arens; Emilio Ferrara 
Following COVID-19 cases around Los Angeles County (see visualization here) and collecting near real-time data from Twitter, Google Maps API and other sources to forecast new cases and the economic fallout of the pandemic. Shared with research community.

Hayoun Lee 
CorvGenSurv: all-in-one genomic contact tracking surveillance of ongoing US COVID-19 outbreak

Hayoun Lee 
Discovery of prognostic combinatorial immune biomarkers that predict acute respiratory distress syndrome in COVID-19 patients

May M. Lee; Ernesto Casillas Jr; Patrick Chan; Joon Choi; Weihuang Vivian Ning; Gloria Wu
Determining baseline characteristics of COVID-19 patients in Los Angeles County + USC Medical Center and at the Keck University Hospital, assess characteristics, inform placement, assess history of exposure to medications.

Yan Liu 
RAPID: A Novel Framework of Knowledge-informed Stochastic Neural Networks for Coronavirus Transmission Modeling and Mitigation

Rob McConnell 
Studying COVID-19 in the Children’s Health Study.

Andrew Marx; Parveen Parmar 
Conducting research linking mobility metrics derived from worldwide daily satellite imagery with the rate of spread of COVID-19 to predict the spread of COVID and hotspots of future pandemics worldwide, as a function of their mobility.

Najm Meshkati 
Systems-Oriented Root-Cause Analysis of the Origins of COVID-19. Learn more here.

Bill Padula 
Studying the need to conduct testing for COVID-19 to understand asymptomatic infection, the value of a treatment of vaccine for COVID-19, and association between national concentrations of registered nurses and mortality of COVID-19.

Vasu Punj 
Proteogenomic based prognostic biomarkers for severe SARS-CoV-2 infection

Anne Peters 
Emergency Funding to Support Underserved T1D Populations Impacted by the COVID-19 Pandemic for the U of Southern California – Community Diabetes Unit.

Viktor K. Prasanna; Ajitesh Srivastava 
Using infection models at the level of cities and counties to predict the speed and severity COVID-19 and allocate medical resources appropriately.

Viktor K. Prasanna 
RAPID: ReCOVER: Accurate Predictions and Resource Allocation for COVID-19 Epidemic Response.

Konstantinos Psounis 
Collecting privacy-sensitive information (important for epidemiologists and governments) via privacy-preserving decentralized contact tracing systems (like the recently announced Google/Apple API that uses mobile devices)

Sonali Saluja
Cameron Kaplan
Conducted survey of nearly 2,000 Los Angeles County residents at the height of the local COVID-19 pandemic to examine racial/ethnic and income-based disparities in access to routine care, COVID-19 testing and vaccination.

Cyrus Shahabi 
RAPID: Collaborative Research: REACT: Real-time Contact Tracing and Risk Monitoring via Privacy-enhanced Mobile Tracking.

Sze-chuan Suen; Maged Dessouky; Neeraj Sood 
Identifying Priority Testing Locations in Southern California for COVID-19 With Transmission Dynamics and Network Data

Gerard J. Tellis; Ashish Sood; Nitish Sood
Working on a study of COVID-19 spread in 36 countries and 50 US states which suggests that aggressive lockdowns need to last at least 7 weeks to gain containment to help answer critical questions. Learn more on SSRN and here.

Noah Wald-Dickler 
The COCOA Project: A longitudinal cohort of adult SARS-CoV-2 hospital survivors

Behavioral, Social Science & Clinical Research

Research at USC on emotional and psychological well-being during COVID-19.

Wael Abd-Almageed 
Doing research to combat misinformation and public anxiety on social networks. This is part of their efforts for the last four years on media forensics funded by DARPA.

Stephen Aguilar 
Teachers Use of Technology and Social Media in Response to COVID-19: An Experience Sampling Study

Eric Anicich; Trevor Foulk; Merrick Osborne; Jake Gale; Michael Schaerer
Surveyed employees at the onset of COVID-19 and found they initially experienced increased levels of powerlessness and decreased levels of authenticity, but that over time employees recovered their sense of autonomy in the form of decreased powerlessness and increased authenticity.

Maria P. Aranda; Rosalba Cain 
Examining the knowledge, practices and attitudes towards COVID-19 among monolingual Spanish-speaking, Latino immigrants living in Los Angeles County.

David Armstrong 
All Feet on Deck: Keeping patients with limb threatening diabetic complications safely at home using mHealth and Telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic

Cynthia Barboza-Wilkes; William Resh; Christine Beckman 
Studying the emotional toll of COVID-19 on local government employees on the front lines of managing the COVID-19 public health response.

David Belson; Shinyi Wu 
Determining the impact of Covid-19 on the operation of rural California hospital clinics by a survey of Critical Access Hospitals for the California Hospital Association.

Daniel Bennett 
Evaluating the Impact of COVID-19 on Labor Market, Social, and Mental Health Outcomes.

Devon Brooks 
Enhancing Healthcare Professional Competence and Responsiveness to Culturally-Diverse and Vulnerable Populations During and After the COVID-19 Pandemic

Jeremy Burke 
The Immediate Impacts of Coronavirus on American’s Economic Security

Kayla de la Haye; Wandi Bruine de Bruin 
Tracking COVID-19 Impacts on Food Access, Diet, and Hunger via the Understanding America Survey.

Matt Delventhal; Eunjee Kwon; Andrii Parkhomenko 
Studying how a long-term shift toward working from home could change the spatial and economic structure of our cities. Link to the paper.

Genevieve Dunton; Shirlene Wang; Bridgette Do; Amy Nguyen 
Studying the effects of the COVID-19 on physical activity and mental health in US adults with online and smartphone-based surveys. Link to papers here and here.

Bruce Elliot; Trevor Lane; Jason Solema 
A study of essential workers and their motivation to stay on the frontlines of COVID-19.

Laura Ferguson 
COVID-19 and the Continuity of Health Services in Kenya: A Multidisciplinary Exploration of the Potential Role of Self-Care Interventions and Community Health Workers

Emilio Ferrara 
Tracking COVID-19 on online platforms to study complex communication phenomena including misinformation, fear, and social dynamics. Also tracking the implications of the outbreak on the 2020 US Presidential election.

Carolin Fleischmann; Peter Cardon; Jolanta Aritz 
Researching the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on global virtual team collaboration.

Ali Gholamrezanezhad; Aidin Abedi; Bhushan Desai; Catherine Song 
Investigating the impact of the COVID-19 on radiologists working in various settings.

Ali Gholamrezanezhad; Bhushan Desai; Aidin Abedi; Anjali Doshi; Veronica Frank; Catherine Song 
Investigating the impact of the COVID-19 on medical students in the US and Europe.

Ali Gholamrezanezhad; Sana Salehi; Sravanthi Reddy; Aidin Abedi; Jung Hwan Um
Working on identifying the CT characteristics of viral pneumonia and defining the disease progression or clinical improvement.

Yijia Guo 
Examining Chinese practitioners’ communication and identity challenges in long-distance work during the quarantine time in Coronavirus.

Yijia Guo 
Investigating how corporate executive communication frames Coronavirus and how their communication impacts employees’ organizational identity.

Assal Habibi; Jonas Kaplan; Sarah Hennessy; Matt Sachs 
Interested in understanding how music can help alleviate mood and help emotion regulation during the self-isolation resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn more here.

Daniel Hackman; Ferol Mennen; Joshua Millstein; Daniel Weisenberger 
Vulnerability to the psychosocial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic: The role of child maltreatment and DNA methylation

John Heidemann; Xiao Song; Yuri Pradkin
Using Internet scanning data to evaluate how Internet use is changing as millions study and work-from-home in response to COVID-19.

Benjamin Henwood 
Comparative Effectiveness of Single-Site and Scattered-Site Permanent Supportive Housing on Patient-Centered and COVID-19 Related Outcomes for People Experiencing Homelessness. Learn more here.

Michael Hochman 
COVID-19 – Independent Medical Education Grant

Adrian Huerta 
COVID-19 Rapid Response to Men of Color programs.

Jill Johnston 
Considering COVID-19 in an Urban Environmental Justice Community Cohort: Impacts, Reslience and Stressors.

Gabriel Kahn; George Constantinou; Jiao Sun 
Collecting data with Crosstown (xtown.la) on everything from crime patterns to traffic and air quality to tell journalistic stories about how Los Angeles is adapting during the shutdown.

Elsi Kaiser; Jennifer Unger 
Effects of psycholinguistic variations on persuasiveness of COVID-19 health messages.

Irene Kang 
COVID-19: Home blood draws for metastatic breast cancer patients on oral therapies.

Arie Kapteyn; Jill Darling; Tania Gutsche; Kyla Thomas 
The Understanding Coronavirus in America project has been tracking the effects of the pandemic since March 10 in the form of about 3000 daily updated graphs; longitudinal microdata on about 7000 nationally representative respondents are available for free download; one can also add questions to the bi-weekly surveys.

Michael Kasperkiewicz 
Evaluation of patients with autoimmune bullous diseases for symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19

Vsevolod Katritch 
Prevention and Treatment of COVID-19 Induced Pulmonary Distress by Stimulating the Protective Arm of Angiotensin System

Ian Kim; Thomas W. Valente 
COVID-19 Information Diffusion in Online Social Networks. Link to the paper.

Andrea Kovacs; Olivier Pernet; 
Toni FrederickEva Operskalski; 
Allison Bearden; Lashonda SpenderJames HomansMikhaela CieloAlice Stek 

Evaluating viral dynamics, immunologic and host risk and protective factors, transmission characteristics within family groups and social networks, impact on socioeconomic factors, and stress and stigma related impacts among Natural History Study of HIV infected women and their families at the MCA Clinic.

Jinkook Lee 
Harmonized Diagnostic Assessment of Dementia (DAD) for Longitudinal Aging Study in India: Administrative Supplement to survey on COVID-19.

May Lee 

Compassionate Care in COVID-19.

Michelle Levander 

2020 Facebook Journalism Project COVID-19.

Roman Liera 

Doctoral Students of Color and the Racialized Faculty Job Market amid COVID-19

Yan Liu 

Misinformation detection on social media; Monitor and forecast COVID-19 spread.

Wendy Mack 
Preventing Child Maltreatment During COVID-19 Using On-line Evidence-based Parenting Interventions

Anuja Majmundar; Jon-Patrick Allem; Tess Boley Cruz; Jennifer B. Unger 
Misinformation at the intersection of COVID-19 and vaping on social media.

Gayla Margolin 
Leveraging biobehavioral sensing and ecological momentary assessment to assess the wellbeing of medical residents during the COVID-19 crisis

Sarah Mawhorter; Meagan Ehlenz 
Studying the timing and process of university residence hall closures in response to COVID-19.

Daniella Meeker 
Rapid Response Data for Discoveries: COVID-19 Clinical data Collection to Promote Better Outcomes

Daniella Meeker 
The Role of Telehealth in COVID-19 Response

Daniella Meeker 
Novel, High-Impact Studies Evaluating Health System and Healthcare Professional Responsiveness to COVID-19

Najmedin Meshkati 
Systematic Analysis of Digital Healthcare Impact on Patient Safety in the COVID-19 Era

Jelena Mirkovic 
Conducting research, with University of Oregon and Colorado State University, on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and stay-at-home policies on network traffic.

Leonard Mitchell 
COVID-19 Regional Recovery, Resiliency, and Stabilization

Dowell Myers 
Social Distancing in Overcrowded Housing, Dense Neighborhoods and Transit Use: Vulnerability to Coronavirus in Los Angeles

Shrikanth Narayanan; Kristina Lerman; Emilio Ferrara; Gayla Margolin; Eric Hsieh 
The health and wellbeing of the health care professionals during the COVID-19 crisis: A multidisciplinary focus combining human-centric AI and biobehavioral sensing.

Loc H. Nguyen
Examined the impact of the resumption of in-person school attendance on COVID-affected child abuse and neglect trends in Florida. Link to the paper.

Loc H. Nguyen
Calculating the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on child abuse and neglect in the U.S. Link to the paper.

Assad Oberai; Ali Gholamrezanezhad; Vinay Duddalwar; Steven Yong Cen; Bino Varghese; Bhushan Desai 
Identifying radiomic and/or integrative (imaging, radiomic, clinical, lab) markers of prognosis and risk stratification in COVID 19 + patients.

Bonnie Olsen 
Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program COVID

Lawrence Palinkas 
Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on TSOS and Trauma Center Providers.

Lawrence Palinkas 
Research Project 1:Survey of State Child Mental Health Policymakers’ Response to COVID-19.

Manuel Pastor 
Op Ed published on Medium, entitled, “Coping with the Crisis: Immigrant Families Face “el Coronavirus’ and the Broken System That Has Left Them So Vulnerable.”

Manuel Pastor 
Roadmap to Recovery: Data, Analysis, and Policy to Inform Local Action to Address Los Angeles County’s Most Vulnerable Populations in Light of COVID-19.

Trenton Place; Lynda McGinnis; Ali Ahmady 
Determine presence of COVID-19 in male and female reproductive tract and impact on fertility.

Adam Rose 
Center of Excellence for Accelerating Operational Efficiency (CAOE): Coronavirus Impacts on US Economy

Lauren Salminen; William Gauderman; Paul Thompson; JC Chen 
Determine the interactive role of environmental stressors (air pollution, psychosocial adversity, etc.) as premorbid predictors of infection and illness severity from COVID-19.

Stephen Sanko 
Assessment of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) event rates, bystander CPR, telecommunicator-assisted CPR, GIS mapping of pre-hospital arrest events and ecology of social support in areas of high risk for OHCA.

Darby Saxbe 
Launched the USC Coronavirus, Health, Isolation, & Resilience in Pregnancy (CHIRP) to study stress and social support in currently-pregnant women and their partners.

Darby Saxbe 
Prenatal Social Connection and Disruption During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Effects on Maternal and Infant Health.

Stephanie Schwartz; Lama Mourad
How could the COVID-19 Crisis affect international asylum norms. Op-ed in Lawfare (complete) and academic article (ongoing).

Beth Smith; Judy Zhou 
Reaching out to pregnant women and new moms interested in sharing their experiences related to COVID-19 through an online survey.

Sze-Chuan Suen 
Using Road Traffic Data to Identify COVID-19 Priority Testing Locations in Southern California

Tianshu Sun 
Studying the impact of COVID19 on omni-channel retailing, digital transformation of firms, economic recovery of small businesses, and online learning.

Prawit Thainiyom; Lauren Martinez; Paula Swinford; Oliver Tacto 
Examining perceptions and behaviors of the college students on well-being, positive mental health, safety, emergency preparedness, and transition to online learning during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic in the US.

Sarah Townsend 
How Increased Online Learning in Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic can Fuel Socioeconomic Inequality By Undermining Academic and Family Relationships

Dorian Traube 
Focusing on how to use technology to support child development interventions. Now that all child development intervention is occurring remotely, our best practice guidelines are the basis for the national response to virtual home visitation.

Jennifer UngerWendy Mack 
Surveying people who tested positive for COVID-19 after they recover to assess the effect of their diagnosis and/or illness on their mental health and identify resilience factors.

Jennifer Unger 
COVID-related stress, resilience, and tobacco/cannabis use among Californians

Ajay Vaidya 
Dapagliflozin in Respiratory Failure in Patients With COVID-19

Helga Van-HerleAjay Vaidya; Peter Xu; Jena Pizula; Audry Chi
A retrospective and prospective clinical records review of patients with COVID-19 to determine cardiovascular outcomes and risk factors through the Department of Cardiology at LAC+USC and Keck Medical Center.

Yongxiang Wang 
Examine Chinese cities’ COVID-19 reopening plans as a window into governments’ economic and social priorities.

Jeff Watson 
Running a collaborative design experiment challenging the public to imagine how teleconferencing software like Zoom can support social connection and well-being through play. More info here: zoomjam.org.

Dmitri Williams 
RAPID: Natural experiments with online games: Support, impact and mitigation during the COVID-19 Pandemic

COVID-19 research at USC related to law, public policy and economics.

Kimon DrakopoulosRamandeep Randhawa 
Their work argues that accuracy of tests are not as important as availability of tests in the early stages of an epidemic and as a result, the latter should be prioritized, even at the expense of accurate results. Paper can be found here.

Sofia Gruskin; Laura Ferguson 
Working at the global level with WHO and UNAIDS, and in low and middle-income countries with implementing partners on human rights, legal and governance issues related to responses to COVID-19.

Erica Jiang; Will Shuo Liu; Lee Seltzer 
The project demonstrates the importance of bank capital in improving local resilience and the complementarity of bank capital and government aid programs. Paper can be found here.

Bhaskar Krishnamachari 
Gemini – A digital twin for data-driven modeling, policy planning and decision making at the University of Southern California

Wenhao Li 
Studying how central banks should best react to the coronavirus pandemic to minimize the economic costs and found direct lending programs to businesses are much more helpful.

Michalle Mor Barak; Charles Kaplan; Arie Kapte
Engaging Diverse Communities in COVID-19 Control: A Value-Based Measure of Health-Safety Climate for Decision Making

Manuel Pastor; Chris Benner 
Project develops and disseminates a vision of “solidarity economics” that can address widening income inequality, rising economic insecurities, and growing social and racial fragmentation while also promoting innovation and economic growth. Recently published at Solidarity Economics — for the Coronavirus Crisis and Beyond.

Adam Rose; Dan Wei; Jakub Hlavka; Terrie Walmsley
Studying the virus’ economic consequences at the National Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE). Work is sponsored by the Center for Accelerating Operational Efficiency.

Gale M. Sinatra 
Conducting an international comparative study of individuals’ responses to persuasive communication regarding COVID-19 stay at home policies with collaborators in Canada, the UK, Italy, and the USA.

Neeraj Sood 
COVID-19 in Nursing Homes: Revealing the impact on stakeholders and opportunities to guide future care delivery

Reginald Tucker-Seeley; Kathleen Wilber 
A policy scan for addressing COVID-19 disparities: An overview of policies and legislation focused on the impact of COVID-19 on vulnerable populations

Phebe Vayanos 
Addressing Ethical Dilemmas during the COVID-19 Pandemic through AI

K-12 Education Research

Research at USC on K-12 education during COVID-19.

Stephen Aguilar 
K-5 teachers coping with changes to imposition of educational technologies.

Theda Douglas 
Head Start/Early Head Start COVID 19 Supplemental Grant

Hernan Galperin 
Galperin and his group are working with the City of Los Angeles and other local governments to map the availability of technology resources for distance learning among K-12 students. The findings are helping inform interventions to provide laptops and connect households.

Stacy E Kratz 
South African Joint Education Trust (JET): Macro, Middle and Micro Level Implications of COVID-19 on South African Education. The ambitious project, titled #OpenUpYourThinking, includes a team of over 30 research professionals examining nine thematic areas focused on all aspects of education throughout the country.

Julie Marsh; Laura Mulfinger 
Investigating how local California districts and communities are responding to the COVID-19 crisis, and the local conditions – with a focus on local governance and civic capacity – contributing to greater resilience (defined as the capacity of the system to cope with and rebound from an external shock and respond to future shocks).

Julie Marsh; Laura Mulfinger 
Examining: 1) How districts/schools of different types/sectors respond to COVID-19 and how these different organizational contexts shape response, particularly with regard to historically marginalized students/families; 2) Conditions contributing to greater organizational resilience? 3) How the crisis shapes parental choice decisions, the politics of choice, and virtual schooling, among other topics.

Anna Saavedra; Morgan Polikoff; Shira Korn; Amie Rapaport; Marshall Garland 
Through the USC Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research’s “Understanding America Study” longitudinal survey panel, Saavedra and her team are collecting and analyzing nationally representative household data related to COVID19 and education, and reporting upon K-12 and postsecondary trends over time.

Student Activities

Student activities at USC related to COVID-19.

2020 Call for Code Global Challenge
Calling all students to join the fight against COVID-19 and climate change. Mitigate the impact of COVID-19 and climate change by creating sustainable solutions using open source technology. Get the details on the 2020 Call for Code Global Challenge, understand its two tracks, and start building today.

Trojans Against Coronavirus Outbreak (TACO)
TACO aims to provide students with the connections, resources, and direction to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and help those most impacted.

USC Care Collective
USC Care Collective was founded in 2020 by USC Students in SWMS 306 Contemporary Studies in LGBTQ Issues as a response to the lack of solidarity and resources for BIPOC, queer/trans, low-income/working-class, undocumented students, and students with disabilities amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

USC Coronavirus Updates and Support for Students
A central place for support, discussion, and updates related to the Coronavirus situation at USC. It’s a student-run group that is not officially associated with, or sanctioned by, the University of Southern California.