ALIKA K. MAUNAKEA, PH.D.

Native Hawaiian born and raised in Waiʻanae, Hawaiʻi, Dr. Maunakea received his B.Sc. degree in Biology at Creighton University (2001) and Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco (2008). He completed Postdoctoral training at the National Institutes of Health (2012) and has since joined the John A. Burns School of Medicine at the University of Hawaiʻi, Mānoa (UHM).

In studying epigenetics for over 20 years, Dr. Maunakea has made several important contributions that have helped advance the field. In particular, he has developed and applied novel high-throughput, genome-wide technologies that survey DNA methylation and histone modifications, both central components of epigenetic processes, and has discovered novel roles for DNA methylation in regulating alternative promoter usage and in pre-mRNA splicing with implications in disease development.

Having been continuously supported with several productive NIH grants throughout his career, Dr. Maunakea is currently a Professor in the Department of Anatomy, Biochemistry, and Physiology, where he applies epigenomic information toward understanding the mechanistic relationships of gene-environment interactions that underlie the development of diseases of health disparities as well as promotes diversity in the research workforce. He leads and collaborates with a cadre of clinical, behavioral, economic, and health disparities researchers on various community-based biomedical research projects while simultaneously mentors underrepresented minority students in multidisciplinary research careers.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Maunakea led efforts to develop infrastructure for community testing and vaccine education to mitigate the adverse impacts of COVID-19 in underserved Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (NHPI) populations in Hawaiʻi as part of the NIH-funded Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics of Underserved Populations (RADxUP) initiative. Notably, he led the development of the first CLIA-certified molecular diagnostics laboratory at a Federally Qualified Health Center in Hawaiʻi serving the largest population of NHPIs in the state. In addition, he established and oversees the Epigenomics Core Facility of Hawaiʻi, the state’s only next-generation sequencing service that integrates this technology with epigenome-wide data of DNA methylation, chromatin structure, histone modifications, and transcriptomic analyses, and bacteria metagenomics for microbiome research.

Dr. Maunakea also directs the Consortium of Research Advancement Facilities and Training (CRAFT), a NIH COBRE-funded resource in the Integrative Center for Precision Nutrition and Human Health at UHM that includes a suite of multiomics core facilities and bioinformatic resources.

By integrating these multiomic approaches, Dr. Maunakea seeks to better understand the socioecological determinants that influence epigenomic and gut microbial pathways that regulate inflammatory states that appear to underlie progression of diabetes, the prevalence of which are disproportionately higher among the NHPI population, to identify novel biomarkers that enable prevention in a recent R01-funded study called the Hawaiʻi Social Epigenomics of Early Diabetes (HI-SEED).

Finally, Dr. Maunakea initiated and leads the Maui Wildfire Exposure Study (MauiWES), a longtitudinal cohort to better understand the immediate and long-term health impacts of those recovering from the mental/emotional and physical trauma of the wildfires in Lahaina and Kula in August 2023.