Cecilio M. Cooper holds a PhD (with Distinction) in African American Studies and a graduate certificate in critical theory from Northwestern University. Cooper researches and teaches Atlantic World literary and visual cultures, with scholarly interests ranging from cartography to alchemy to demonology to medicine. Using materials from the 13th century onward, Cooper's first book manuscript examines how Blackness figures in cosmological constitutions of territory throughout Europe and the Americas.

Charles Connaughton joins the A. B. Freeman School of Business from the Foster School of Business at the University of Washington. His research examines how firms can best create and benefit from breakthrough inventions. He utilizes machine learning in his research to bring a broader perspective to previously intractable research questions. Prior to pursuing his PhD, he founded several startups in the San Francisco Bay Area, and maintains an entrepreneurial approach to his academic work as well.

Christine Capetola works at the intersections of queer, Black, sound, affect and performance studies. She is interested in how both sound and "feltness" complicate ocularcentric notions of representation. She holds a PhD in American studies from the University of Texas–Austin and a MA in performance studies from New York University. Her book project, Sonic Femmeness: Black Sounds, Felt History, and Vibrational Identity, explores how Black pop stars, activists and intellectuals in the 1980s and 2010s used femmeness to navigate their historical moments of protest and pandemic.

Caryn Bell’s research focuses on the unique impacts of socioeconomic status (SES) and place on cardiovascular disease risk factors in Black Americans and racial disparities. Her work explores the nuanced ways in which SES is associated with obesity and related behaviors in Black women and men by examining the role of place and sociocultural factors. She uses varied techniques including spatial statistics and mapping approaches. She also examines how place shapes structural racism in the United States and the implications for Black health and racial health inequities.

Brigham Walker’s research focuses on how providers, payers and patients behave in response to new information or incentives. Recent papers, focused on discrimination and equity in health and labor settings, have been published in JAMA and Labour Economics. He will teach the Health Services Research Methods doctoral course this year.

Bilon Khambu’s research has focused on understanding autophagy, its molecular mechanism, and its pathophysiological function in metabolic liver diseases such as nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, alcoholic liver disease and hepatocellular carcinoma. Khambu's recent work has focused on disease degeneration and regeneration in chronic liver disease, examining the mechanism of liver injury, inflammation, ductular reaction, fibrosis and tumorigenesis, particularly the role of hepatic factors such as HMGB1 in the development of various liver pathologies.