Research

Publications

• DNA, Self-Reported Ancestry, and Social Scientific Inquiry.

  Luyin Zhang and Sam Trejo. Demography, Forthcoming.

• Leveraging Genomic Data to Document Within-Race Attractiveness Penalties Among Black Americans.

  Beza Taddess, Luyin Zhang, and Sam Trejo. Equal first authorship. Sociological Science, 2026.

• Why Is Life Expectancy in England and Wales Falling Behind? A Cause-of-Death Decomposition Approach.

  Antonino Polizzi, Andrea M. Tilstra, Luyin Zhang, and Jennifer Beam Dowd. Population Studies, 2026.

• Indirect Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cause-of-Death Analysis of Life Expectancy Changes in 24 Countries, 2015–2022.

  Antonino Polizzi, Luyin Zhang, Sergey Timonin, Aashish Gupta, Jennifer Beam Dowd, David A. Leon, and José Manuel Aburto. PNAS Nexus, 2025.

• US Exceptionalism? International Trends in Midlife Mortality.

  Jennifer Beam Dowd, Katarzyna Doniec, Luyin Zhang, and Andrea Tilstra. International Journal of Epidemiology, 2024.

• Life Expectancy Changes Since COVID-19.

  Jonas Schöley, José Manuel Aburto, Ilya Kashnitsky, Maxi S. Kniffka, Luyin Zhang, Hannaliis Jaadla, Jennifer Beam Dowd, and Ridhi Kashyap. Nature Human Behaviour, 2022.

• Quantifying Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic Through Life-Expectancy Losses: A Population-Level Study of 29 Countries.

  José Manuel Aburto, Jonas Schöley, Ilya Kashnitsky, Luyin Zhang, Charles Rahal, Trifon I. Missov, Melinda Mills, Jennifer Beam Dowd, and Ridhi Kashyap. International Journal of Epidemiology, 2021.

In Chinese

• Premarital Cohabitation in China and Its Impacts on Marriage and Fertility Trajectories.

  Luyin Zhang. Population Research, 2020.

• The Transition of Fertility Intention Propensity of Chinese Web-Users – the Application of Public Opinion Big Data Analysis.

  Ting Li, Yuan Jie, Xia Lu, Yinghong Xiong, and Luyin Zhang. Population Research, 2019.

   

Working Papers

• Uncovering the Hidden Magnitude of Within-Race/Ethnicity Skin Tone Inequality.

  Luyin Zhang, Varsha Menon, and Sam Trejo.

• Beyond Pedigree: Realized Genetic Relatedness and Sibling Bonds.

  Luyin Zhang, Beza Taddess, and Dalton Conley.

• Within-Family GWAS Does Not Ameliorate the Decline in Prediction Accuracy across Populations.

  Luyin Zhang and Dalton Conley. R&R.

   

Selected Work in Progress

• Skin Tone Stratification in Socioeconomic and Health Outcomes: Evidence From Ancestry Disequilibrium Regression in All of Us.

  Luyin Zhang and Sam Trejo.

• A Genomic Study of Skin Tone Disparities in Biological Aging and Healthy Longevity Among Black and Hispanic Americans.

  Luyin Zhang

• Random Inheritance, Upward Consequences: Quasi-Experimental Evidence on Offspring Genotype and Parental Health.

  Luyin Zhang and Dalton Conley.

• Genetic Ancestry-Related Assortative Mating of U.S. Black and Hispanic Populations.

  Luyin Zhang, Sam Trejo, and Dalton Conley.

• The Gap Within the Gap: Using Continuous Measures of Racialization to Study School Racial Segregation.

  Varsha Menon, Luyin Zhang, and Sam Trejo.