Brenda McCowan, Ph.D.
Neuroscience and Behavior Unit
Core Scientist
Professor
Population Health and Reproduction
UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine
Dr. McCowan’s program focuses on the large matrilineal social groups of rhesus macaques unique to the CNPRC as well as captive and wild macaque groups in both Europe and Asia. One important goal of this program is to employ evolutionary and social network theories for practical applications at the human-animal interface using an interdisciplinary framework comprised of computational biology, genomics, epidemiology, and behavioral ecology.
Social Networks and Health
Dr. McCowan's research focuses on how the spatial and mathematical relations of networks relate to the content and quality of relationships, and how such variation influences a diversity of health outcomes at the individual and population levels of large social groups of macaques as a translational model for humans.
