Pepper Center
Movement is Freedom
Our “Pepper Center” conducts geriatric research that helps older people to move freely and maintain their independence. By applying science to the physical needs of older people, we are creating evidence to support improvements in the lives of current generations as well as those to come. Our research team is part of a nationwide network of Older Americans Independence Centers funded by the National Institute on Aging. We welcome your interest and support as the Pepper Center continues to grow.
Claude D. Pepper
About Us
Learn where our name and funding comes from, and about the people who make the Pepper Center run.
Making a Difference
Impact
We have formed a community around a vibrant group of researchers and their supporters. Read some of our favorite publications.
Research in Action
Service Cores
Research within the Pepper Center is organized within five core areas. You may request a service related to a specific research core.
Mentoring
Research Training
The Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center offers specialized research training that spans across the translational spectrum.
Grants
Funding Opportunities
Funding within the Pepper Center supports investigators, services, pilot studies, external studies, and development projects.
Participants wanted
Active Studies
We recruit older adults to participate in new and active studies. Compensation may be provided.
News
Advisor to Pepper Center, Carolyn M. Tucker…
In recognition of her work to build healthier communities and providing hundreds with power over cancer, Carolyn M. Tucker, Ph.D., has received…
Summer 2024 Pepper Center Announcements
External Advisory Board meeting in May On May 23, 2024, the Pepper Center held a highly productive External Advisory Board meeting. The primary…
Researchers Incubate Ideas and Welcome Critiques…
A new interactive series launched in February by the University of Florida’s Department of Health Outcomes and Biomedical Informatics and…
UF Researchers Host Summit on End-of-Life Care
UF Health Cancer Center members Carma Bylund, Ph.D., a professor in the department of health outcomes and biomedical informatics…
Mission
The mission of the University of Florida’s Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center is to eliminate physical disability in older age by understanding mobility loss and developing research-based treatment strategies. The work by our multidisciplinary and talented group of investigators seeks to:
- Assess risk by studying the multi-complexities of mobility loss
- Develop therapies by testing and optimizing rehabilitation
- Educate by training new investigators in aging and mobility loss research
Our research has high potential to improve the quality of life for people in their golden years and to inform the policies and practices that affect our future.
complexity in Aging Research
Our portfolio of mobility research covers a wide range of complex and core topics and engages researchers at several stages of their careers. Our program for Junior Scholars helps early career researchers to become fully engaged in aging research.
Our researchers apply a framework of multi-complexity that accounts for variability among individuals. A complex adaptive system, for example, is a collection of individuals with freedom to act in ways that are not totally predictable and whose actions are interconnected and influential on each other.
Research on Mobility
As the U.S. population ages, more and more people are facing difficult and new physical challenges. To help them, researchers at UF and beyond are trying to unravel the many threads that affect how an older person moves. Mobility research seeks to understand the complexity of declining mobility and to develop strategies to counteract it. We believe that freedom of movement is an essential element of independence. Movement is freedom.
Pepper Center Network
The Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center at the University of Florida collaborates broadly with researchers across the U.S. Because we are based in Florida, our research often involves the state’s citizens of age 65 or older, who represent more than 20% of the state’s population.
We enjoy significant support and access to world-class facilities within our home base: UF College of Medicine’s Department of Health Outcomes and Biomedical Informatics (HOBI). Within HOBI, faculty conducting aging research are concentrated in the Division of Clinical and Population Health Integration (CliPHIR).
For any questions or concerns, please contact us.