Shane Fernandez, PhD

Dr. Shane Fernandez is a Postdoctoral Fellow in Radiology and Imaging Sciences at the Indiana University School of Medicine and a Fulbright Scholar with interdisciplinary training in psychology, statistics, and genomics. His research focuses on leveraging multiomic approaches to understand biological heterogeneity in Alzheimer’s disease (AD), with a growing emphasis on elucidating the molecular mechanisms linking diet and metabolic health to dementia risk and progression.

Shane’s scientific perspective is informed by more than a decade of experience working with AD clinical trials and lifestyle studies prior to beginning his PhD. This work provided extensive training in study design, neuropsychological assessment, biomarker-informed recruitment, and the measurement of cognitive change in therapeutic contexts. Building on this foundation, Shane’s doctoral training emphasized advanced statistical modeling and genetic analyses to characterize variability in cognitive decline.

Shane’s current research integrates omics, imaging, and clinical data to investigate how dietary exposures and metabolic pathways influence neurodegeneration and cognitive trajectories. By combining multi-domain data integration with rigorous phenotyping, His goal is to identify biologically informed targets that can support precision health and risk-reduction strategies for dementia. Shane aims to further develop expertise in multiomic integration and apply this to advance mechanistic understanding of modifiable risk factors in AD.