Jessica Petrick, PhD, MPH

Assistant Professor, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine

Biography

Dr. Jessica Petrick’s research program focuses on the epidemiology of gastrointestinal cancers, including colorectal, liver, and esophageal. Dr. Petrick became a co-Investigator with the Black Women’s Health Study (BWHS) in 2019, but she has been collaborating with BWHS since she began her post-doctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in 2014. BWHS is a member of the NCI Cancer Cohort Consortium and participated in the Liver Cancer Pooling Project, within which Dr. Petrick led numerous studies. The emphasis of her current research portfolio is on nutritional and molecular factors, including the metabolome and microbiome, which may contribute to racial disparities along the cancer continuum—from precursor lesions to invasive cancer through mortality.

Publications

  • Published 9/16/2025

    Lima SM, Minlikeeva AN, Johnson CE, Guertin KA, Bandera EV, Zheng W, Bethea TN, Petrick JL, Joslin CE, Myers ER, Harris HR, Peres LC, Setiawan VW, Wu AH, Rosenberg L, Schildkraut JM, Ochs-Balcom HM. Regular physical inactivity and ovarian cancer risk in the Ovarian Cancer in Women of African Ancestry (OCWAA) Consortium. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2025 Sep 16. PMID: 40956289.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 8/26/2025

    Rothbard SM, Palmer JR, Chiu LS, Rosenberg L, Petrick JL. Fish Intake and Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids in Relation to Colorectal Cancer Risk in the Black Women's Health Study. J Nutr. 2025 Aug 26. PMID: 40865871.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 6/16/2025

    Mendez JS, Queme B, Fu Y, Morrison J, Lewinger JP, Kawaguchi E, Mi H, Obón-Santacana M, Moratalla-Navarro F, Martín V, Moreno V, Lin Y, Bien SA, Qu C, Su YR, White E, Harrison TA, Huyghe JR, Tangen CM, Newcomb PA, Phipps AI, Thomas CE, Conti DV, Wang J, Platz EA, Keku TO, Newton CC, Um CY, Kundaje A, Shcherbina A, Murphy N, Gunter MJ, Dimou N, Papadimitriou N, Bézieau S, van Duijnhoven FJ, Männistö S, Rennert G, Wolk A, Hoffmeister M, Brenner H, Chang-Claude J, Tian Y, Le Marchand L, Cotterchio M, Tsilidis KK, Bishop DT, Melaku YA, Lynch BM, Buchanan DD, Ulrich CM, Ose J, Peoples AR, Pellatt AJ, Li L, Devall MA, Campbell PT, Albanes D, Weinstein SJ, Berndt SI, Gruber SB, Ruiz-Narvaez E, Song M, Joshi AD, Drew DA, Petrick JL, Chan AT, Giannakis M, Hsu L, Peters U, Gauderman WJ, Stern MC. Red meat intake interacts with a TGF-ß-pathway-based polygenic risk score to impact colorectal cancer risk: Application of a novel approach for polygenic risk score construction. medRxiv. 2025 Jun 16. PMID: 40568668.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 5/21/2025

    Watling CZ, Petrick JL, Graubard BI, Zhang X, Barnett MJ, Buring JE, Chen Y, Eliassen AH, Gaziano M, Kang JH, Koshiol J, Huang WY, Lee IM, Moore SC, Mucci LA, Neuhouser ML, Newton CC, Palmer JR, Rosenberg L, Sesso HD, Shrubsole M, Tinker L, Triplette M, Um CY, Visvanathan K, Wactawski-Wende J, Willett W, Wu F, Zheng W, Hofmann J, Purdue MP, Campbell PT, Barupal D, McGlynn KA. Circulating per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances and liver cancer risk: a nested case-control analysis of individual participant data from 12 prospective cohorts. Environ Health Perspect. 2025 May 21. PMID: 40397817.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 5/2/2025

    Omofuma OO, Rusiecki JA, Petrick JL, Falk RT, Wheeler W, Pfeiffer RM, Camargo MC, Cook MB. Circulating Inflammation Biomarkers and the Risk of Esophageal Adenocarcinoma: A Nested Case-Control Study in the Department of Defense Serum Repository. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2025 May 02; 34(5):649-657. PMID: 40079721.

    Read at: PubMed

View All 109 Publications:   View Full Profile in BUMC

Other Positions

  • Center Faculty Member, Slone Epidemiology Center
    Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine

Websites

Education

  • University of North Carolina, PhD
  • Case Western Reserve University, MPH
  • Case Western Reserve University, BS

View all profiles