Per
Executive Order 14434,
federal agencies are now using
"Super Intelligence" (SI) in place of
"Artificial Intelligence" (AI).
You may see both terms across NIH content
during this transition.
PPB’s goals are to improve the health of women before, during, and after pregnancy; increase infant survival; and ensure the long-term health of mothers and children. Specifically, the branch supports research to understand fetal development and improve ways to diagnose, treat, and prevent diseases during pregnancy and in newborns.
As the focal point for NICHD extramural research and training in maternal-fetal medicine, neonatology, and related fields, branch staff also engage with and support investigators to identify knowledge gaps and opportunities for scientific advancement.
Improving Health Before, During, and After Pregnancy: Includes research on maternal health from pre-pregnancy, through pregnancy, and postpartum, including maternal morbidity and mortality
Reducing Preterm Labor and Birth and Other Birth Complications: Studies factors affecting the initiation and completion of labor, including the physiology, endocrinology, and medical management of birth
Increasing Infant Survival, Free from Disease and Disability: Addresses causes, prevention, treatment, and medical management of conditions associated with or resulting from birth and the newborn period
Ensuring the Long-Term Health of Mothers and Children: Seeks to understand aspects of birth, newborn, and infant care that may influence long-term health
Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research: Supports and conducts clinical trials on cost-effective and sustainable interventions to improve maternal and infant health outcomes globally, inclusive of US populations
Human Placenta Project: Supports improvement to existing and development of new technologies for real-time assessment of placental development across pregnancy
Implementing a Maternal health and PRegnancy Outcomes Vision for Everyone (IMPROVE) Initiative: Supports activities to reduce preventable causes of maternal death and improve maternal health; PPB leads and coordinates this NIH-wide effort
Maternal-Fetal Medicine Units (MFMU) Network: Conducts clinical research to reduce maternal morbidity, fetal, and infant morbidity related to preterm birth, fetal growth anomalies, and pregnancy complications, and to provide the rationale for evidence-based, cost-effective obstetric practice
Neonatal Research Network (NRN): Conducts clinical trials and observational studies to improve the chances for survival without neurodevelopmental impairment for infants born premature, low-birth weight, or with other serious conditions
Advancing Clinical Trials in Neonatal Opioid Withdrawal Syndrome (ACT NOW): Informs the clinical care of infants exposed to opioids in the womb; part of the NIH-wide Helping to End Addiction Long-term® Initiative
Stillbirth Research Consortium: Brings together four research centers and a data coordinating center to understand the causes of stillbirth, develop tools for its prediction and prevention, and test new clinical care strategies, guided in part by input from People With Lived Experiences
Extremely Preterm Birth Outcomes Tool (current link: https://www.nichd.nih.gov/research/supported/EPBO). This tool shows the range of possible outcomes for infants born extremely preterm. The outcomes are based on data from infants born between 22-25 weeks of pregnancy at U.S. hospitals in the NRN between 2006 and 2012.
Research Challenges and Competitions: These mechanisms encourage research, development, and innovation among communities that do not traditionally apply for funding support. PPB leads and has led several challenges related to improving maternal health.
PPB-funded studies available in NICHD’s Data and Specimen Hub (DASH), including data from the Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research, MFMU Network, National Infant Sleep Position Study, and Stillbirth Collaborative Research Network
Nahida Chakhtoura, M.D., MsGH, Branch Chief Main Research Areas: Maternal health; maternal infections; congenital infections; women's health; cohort studies and clinical trials; NIH-wide IMPROVE initiative
Stephanie Archer, M.S., Program Analyst Main Research Areas: Project manager for Neonatal Research Network and neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS) groups
Guillermina Girardi, Ph.D., Program Officer Main Research Areas: Reproductive immunology; autoimmunity; recurrent miscarriages; preeclampsia; gestational diabetes; in utero/developmental origins of disease; imaging (MRI and 1HMRS [spectroscopy]) in placental insufficiency and atypical neurodevelopment; translational studies (particularly therapeutic strategies to prevent placental insufficiency)
Diane Gumina, Ph.D., Program Officer Main Research Areas: Cellular mechanisms of placental insufficiency; development of treatment modalities and improved diagnostic technologies for pregnancy-associated complications; women’s health; translational research and clinical trials; basic mechanisms underlying neonatal outcomes
John Ilekis, Ph.D., Program Officer Main Research Areas: Cell-, molecular-, and genetic-based studies in pregnancy and perinatology; placental development and function; trophoblast differentiation; basic mechanisms underlying maternal and fetal disorders, such as spontaneous preterm birth, preeclampsia, and fetal growth restriction; parturition; fetal pathophysiology/programming and developmental origins of disease; perinatal microbiome and metagenomics; epigenetics, molecular biomarker discovery
Monica Longo, M.D., Program Officer Main Research Areas: High-risk pregnancy; hypertensive disorder of pregnancy; diabetes (type 1, type 2, and gestational); fetal developmental origins of health and disease; metabolic and cardiovascular programming; pregnancy as a window of future maternal health; cardiovascular risk after pregnancy
Megan Mitchell, M.P.H., Program Officer Main Research Areas: Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy; postpartum cardiovascular/hypertension management; postpartum care and mental health; obstetric infection and sepsis; maternal morbidity and mortality, including risk prediction tools; stillbirth prevention research; community-based and patient-centered approaches to improving maternal health outcomes
Augusto Schmidt, M.D., Ph.D., Program Officer Main Research Areas: Prematurity and prematurity-related complications; neurodevelopmental outcomes of children born preterm; neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome; neonatal hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy; sudden unexplained infant death; neonatal monitoring; translational research and neonatal clinical trials.
Road to Prevention of Stillbirth Requests for Applications (RFAs). NIH has published two RFAs to fund research centers and a data coordinating center that will form an integrated and collaborative Stillbirth Research Consortium. This consortium will support stillbirth-relevant basic, translational, clinical, and/or data sciences research across the United States, with a particular emphasis on ways to decrease the incidence of stillbirth in vulnerable populations.
RFA-HD-25-010:Road to Prevention of Stillbirth – Clinical Research Centers (UG1 Clinical Trial Optional)
RFA-HD-25-011: The Road to Prevention of Stillbirth – Data Coordinating Center (UM2 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
HPP Research Showcase: Read about the tools and tests researchers are designing to revolutionize our understanding of the human placenta and to enable the development of safe, noninvasive, real-time assessment of human placenta development and function across pregnancy.
PPB-supported researchers developed and recently updated a tool using data from the Neonatal Research Network that shows outcome trends for infants born at extremely preterm gestations. To access the tool and learn about the data, visit the Extremely Preterm Birth Outcomes Tool webpage.
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