Fiona C. Baker
Director of Center for Health Sciences and Human Sleep Research Program, Biosciences Division
Fiona Baker, Ph.D. is the Director of the Human Sleep Research Program at SRI International, which she joined in 2005. She focuses on understanding the interplay between sleep physiology and human health across the lifespan. Baker is a world expert on issues of sleep in women. Her areas of research include sleep EEG, sex differences in sleep, sleep in menopause, relationships between sleep and cardiovascular functioning, and interactions between brain development, sleep, and behaviors such as alcohol use, across adolescence.
Baker has received funding from the National Institutes of Health, and is currently PI on two consortium projects about adolescent development: The National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA) and the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development study (ABCD). She has published extensively on issues of sleep in women in the context of reproductive stages; her research has advanced understanding of insomnia that develops during the menopausal transition, and revealed interactions between the female reproductive system and sleep and circadian regulatory systems.
Baker also holds an appointment as Honorary Professorial Research Fellow in the Brain Function Research Group, School of Physiology, at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Baker has published more than 80 scientific papers and has a Ph.D. degree in physiology from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
View Baker’s publications on Research Gate and Google Scholar.
Recent publications
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Identification and characterization of screen use trajectories from late childhood to adolescence in a US-population based cohort study
This study will identify and characterize the subgroups of adolescents sharing similar trajectories of screen use from childhood to adolescence.
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Associations between alcohol use and sex-specific maturation of subcortical gray matter morphometry from adolescence to adulthood: Replication across two longitudinal samples
This project used generalized additive mixed models to examine sex-specific development of subcortical volumes and associations with recent alcohol use…
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Higher blood pressure and weight observed among early adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic
The aim of this study is to quantify differences in blood pressure and weight before and during the COVID-19 pandemic among a demographically diverse national sample of early adolescents.
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The Menstrual Cycle and Sleep
Although objective sleep continuity remains unchanged across the regular, asymptomatic menstrual cycle, activity in the sleep electroencephalogram varies.
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Social epidemiology of Fitbit daily steps in early adolescence
Our objective was to examine differences in device-based step metrics, including daily step count by sociodemographic factors among a diverse sample of 10-to-14-year-old adolescents in the US.
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Bedtime screen use behaviors and sleep outcomes: Findings from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study
We aim to determine associations between bedtime screen time behaviors and sleep outcomes in a national study of early adolescents.