Spartan Profile: Jeff Lemmer

Jeff Lemmer was recently added to the kinesiology faculty in 2002 as an assistant professor in exercise physiology.  Dr. Lemmer comes to MSU with an impressive academic background.  He received his masters degree in exercise physiology at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs where he spent considerable time testing athletes at the Olympic Training Center.  He then completed his Ph.D. at The University of Maryland followed by a Post-Doctoral Fellowship at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.  It was during these studies that Dr. Lemmer developed his research interests examining the role of exercise and physical activity on improving the aging process.

During his academic preparation, Dr. Lemmer’s research interests led him to find that the elevation in resting energy expenditure often found with resistance training was in fact, influenced by gender, and not by age.  However, his research has indicated that strength changes in response to a period of training are influenced by age.  Dr. Lemmer plans to continue this line of research using molecular biology techniques such as the Western Blot technique, which assesses changes in protein content of the muscle, and a technique called reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), which assesses changes in gene expression.  Dr. Lemmer hopes to use these and other techniques in his laboratory at Michigan State University to focus on the effects of resistance training on muscle metabolism in the elderly, as well as how nutrition may interact with these changes.

In addition to furthering his research interests, Dr. Lemmer currently teaches the two courses: applied human anatomy and neuromuscular and endocrine responses to exercise.  He also is the course coordinator for the applied human anatomy laboratory.  While successfully juggling the multiple tasks of a new faculty member and becoming acclimated to the university, Dr. Lemmer also serves on the Graduate Studies Committee.   In his free time, Dr. Lemmer enjoys spending time with his wife Tammy and their two children, Nick and Katie.  He also enjoys cycling and playing hockey.