Alumni Trainees

Post-Docs

Marc Adams, PhD is a professor and the founding director of the Population Health PhD program in the College of Health Solutions at Arizona State University. He is a behavioral scientist with a BA in Psychology, MPH in Health Promotion, and PhD in Public Health/Behavioral Science. His focus is on improving physical activity and promoting healthy eating to prevent cardiovascular disease (CVD). Dr. Adams’ interests include designing behavioral interventions and understanding how they function within their environments, such as neighborhoods. He has led multiple teams in innovating adaptive digital behavior change interventions and AI/deep-learning tool development for measuring pedestrian environment features. During his T32 training, he worked under Dr. Jim Sallis, focusing on the association between urban planning and physical activity internationally as part of the IPEN Adult study. Dr. Adams is the principal investigator of several NIH-funded studies focused on physical activity and healthy eating. He has co-authored over 120 peer-reviewed papers and book chapters and is a Senior Sustainability Scientist with the Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU. In his spare time, Dr. Adams enjoys traveling, cooking, hiking, UTV riding, and sailing.

Tara Allen, M..D., M.Sc. earned her undergraduate degree from Vanderbilt University, where she double majored in Molecular & Cellular Biology and Political Science. She began her academic career while a student at Vanderbilt, publishing papers related to cardiac sarcomere physiology and protein regulation and was selected for an internship at Duke University focused on improving methods for cardiac transplant procurement. Tara then studied abroad at University College London and worked as an MCAT course instructor for the Princeton Review during her time at Vanderbilt. After undergraduate studies, Tara returned home to Kentucky for medical school at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine where she was selected as the Saha Cardiovascular Medical Student of the Year and for an NIH CTSA TL1 Training Grant that afforded her the ability to earn a Master of Science Degree in Clinical & Translational Science leading a thesis project on improving risk-stratification for adverse outcomes in patients undergoing LVAD implantation. She completed her Internal Medicine residency training at Boston Medical Center where she was selected for the Framingham Heart Study Pathway and developed a strong interest in epidemiology and improving ways we use already available clinical data for patient care. Amid the COVID pandemic, Tara connected with leaders in our program and was selected for  our two-year T32 in Integrated Cardiovascular Epidemiology during which she led projects and statistical analyses related to subclinical atherosclerosis, nutritional epidemiology, and improving risk discrimination scores for the prevention of cardiovascular disease. Tara was hired full-time at the San Diego VA Medical Center with a joint appointment in Hospital Medicine and Vascular Medicine and continues her ongoing research work in using measures of subclinical atherosclerosis to improve cardiovascular risk stratification and management.  Outside of medicine, Tara enjoys scuba diving with her husband, trail running, and playing with their son.

Erica Ambeba, MPH, PhD received her MPH at Drexel University, and holds a PhD in Epidemiology from the University of Pittsburgh. During her time as a T32 fellow, she worked on various projects, including determining the association of the gut microbiome and cardiovascular disease among participants enrolled in the Osteoporotic Fractures in Men (MrOS) Study, and examining the association between Life’s Simple 7 and psychosocial factors such as perceived quality of life and social connectedness among participants enrolled in the Community of Mine study. Dr. Ambeba is co-founder of Samuel Taylor Homes, LLC., an adult residential facility in San Diego that seeks to serve the needs of vulnerable populations. Specifically, she serves as financial data analyst for the facility.

John Bellettiere has training in economics, behavioral science, and epidemiology. His research focuses on human behavior and how it relates to health. Dr. Bellettiere is Adjunct Assistant Professor in the UC San Diego Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health, where he works with PhD candidate Osika Tripathi to study secondhand and thirdhand cannabis and tobacco smoke. Dr. Bellettiere is also a senior quantitative researcher at Meta, where his work focuses on improving global mental health. In the 2020-2021 academic year, Dr. Bellettiere was awarded Professor of the Year in the CRESH/MAS program.

Tanya Benitez, PhD is an Assistant Professor at Brown University, School of Public Health. She is a behavioral scientist focused on prevention of lifestyle-related chronic disease among Latinos. She received her PhD in Health Education and Promotion from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), a Master’s in Social Work from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and BS in Child and Family Studies from the University of New Hampshire. Her research involves the development and testing of culturally relevant interventions to increase physical activity and improve diet quality using technology-based platforms. Her current NIH-funded studies expand on her T32 training and research to prevent cardiometabolic disease and cancer in Latinas through promotion of aerobic and muscle-strengthening activity, and healthy nutrition habits. Dr. Benitez received the 2019 New Investigator Award from the New England Chapter of the American College of Sports Medicine and 2022 Alumni Award for Research from UAB.

Harpreet Bhatia, MD received his Bachelor of Arts in International Studies with a focus on American Government from Johns Hopkins University, and completed medical school at Emory University School of Medicine. He completed internal medicine residency, followed by being selected as Chief Medical Resident at New York-Presbyterian Hospital / Weill Cornell Medical College. He is currently a fourth year fellow in Cardiovascular Disease at UC San Diego and served as Chief Cardiology Fellow during his third year. His interests, both clinically and in research, center around the prevention of cardiovascular diseases related to atherosclerosis. In particular, he is focused on epidemiology, risk stratification, and treatment options as they relate to individuals with abnormal lipid biomarkers (Lipoprotein(a) and oxidized phospholipids). He is also focused on early detection of subclinical disease through the use of coronary artery calcium (CAC), and his research centers around ways to implement CAC scoring and improve scoring methodology. He is concurrently enrolled in the UC San Diego MAS program in Clinical Research and his thesis focuses on therapeutic options for the primary prevention of cardiovascular disease in individuals with elevated Lipoprotein(a).

Jordan A. Carlson, PhD, MA is an Associate Professor at Children’s Mercy Kansas City with over 15 years of experience leading research on physical activity and public health. His research investigates strategies for increasing active living as a wide-reaching source of daily physical activity. He is particularly interested in how technology-based, community-based, and policy-based approaches can support health in marginalized population groups.

Noe Crespo, PhD is a public health and behavioral science researcher. He received his bachelors and master’s degree in exercise science from California State University Los Angeles, a masters of public health degree from the University of Southern California, and a PhD in Public Health from the San Diego State University/University of California San Diego. He also completed a post-doctoral fellowship at UC San Diego in cardiovascular disease epidemiology and prevention. Dr. Crespo is currently an Associate Professor at San Diego State University in the School of Public Health. His research focuses on physical activity, fitness, sedentary behavior and nutrition interventions to prevent chronic disease among Latinos and underserved populations. This includes studies conducted in partnership with city recreation centers, clinics and schools to conduct and evaluate effective public health approaches. Recently, Dr. Crespo has also conducted research to prevent COVID-19, increase COVID testing and vaccination among underserved communities.

Katie Crist, PhD, MPH is an Assistant Project Scientist in the Urban Studies & Planning Department at UC San Diego.  Her research is focused on understanding how programmatic and built environment interventions impact physical activity and health. She received her PhD in 2019 from University of Southern Denmark, an MPH in Chronic Disease Epidemiology from the Yale School of Public Health, and a BS in Biology from Cornell University. Prior to her doctoral work, she managed two large prospective interventions that combined individual behavior change strategies with built environment improvements to increase walking in older adults. Her dissertation focused on data driven collaboration between physical activity researchers and transportation planners, with a focus on improving health through active transportation. She is currently leading a 3-year study funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Evidence for Action program to understand how travel behaviors, health and economic outcomes change during the COVID-19 recovery and in the context of a new light rail extension to campus. She aims to contribute evidence to build communities that support active lifestyles, health equity, and climate sustainability.

Aubrey Doede, PhD RN earned her undergraduate degree in Human Biology from Claremont McKenna College. After several years’ experience in clinical research, she obtained both her Master’s degree in nursing and continued on to earn her PhD, both from the University of Virginia. Her dissertation work focused on wind trajectory analysis and the impact of airborne pollutants on childhood asthma. During her graduate studies, she also gained research and teaching experience in clinical trials and global health, focusing mainly on non-communicable diseases including cancer and cardiovascular disease. In addition to her postdoctoral focus on environmental determinates of health, she is currently pursuing a Master’s in Advanced Studies in Clinical Research with a concentration in Translational Science.

Daniel Ervin, PhD received a BA in psychology from George Washington University, an MA in Geography from the University of Wyoming, and a PhD in Geography from UC Santa Barbara. He is a Program Specialist for the East-West Center in Honolulu, researching Climate Change and Health in the Republic of the Marshall Islands. His research interests include the interactions between place, space, migration, and health, Planetary Health, and geographic and health research methods.

Nketi Forbang, MD, MPH received his undergraduate degree in Biology from Truman State University, and his M.D. from the University of Kansas Medical Center. Dr. Forbang has completed two years of General Surgery residency at Howard University Hospital, and an NHLBI T32 post-doctoral fellow at UC San Diego. He also completed a Master’s Degree in Public Health (MPH), with a focus in Epidemiology, as part of his fellowship. Along with attending conferences, seminars, and monthly journal clubs, his T32 projects included investigating the progression of Peripheral Arterial Disease (PAD) in Diabetic patients. This study specifically looks at Ankle-brachial Index as a measure of PAD disease progression in diabetics. He also determined anatomical variations in the location of the abdominal aortic bifurcation in the population, and associations of these variations with cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors and CVD events. In his spare time, Dr. Forbang enjoys spending time with family and friends, sports, Latin dance, and surfing.

Taynara Formagini, Ph.D., M.Sc., earned her undergraduate and master’s degrees in Psychology from the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF) in Brazil. In 2012, Taynara received a national fellowship called Science without Borders for a year-long experience in the U.S. to gain research experience in smoking cessation trials. After finishing her master’s thesis examining smoking patterns in Brazil, she permanently moved to the U.S. to pursue her doctoral education. Taynara received her Ph.D. in Health Policy and Management from the Department of Population Health at the University of Kansas School of Medicine in 2022. Her research focuses on the prevention of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and associated risk factors among Latinos and other vulnerable communities. Taynara’s research agenda aims to improve healthy lifestyle behaviors with a focus on fostering sustainable changes. Grounded in the socio-ecological framework, her work is based on the recognition that behaviors and health outcomes are shaped by factors spanning interpersonal, community, and socioeconomic dimensions. As part of her postdoctoral work, she joined her primary mentor, Dr. Elva Arredondo, in conducting an NIH-funded clinical trial aimed at enhancing churches' capacity to implement and sustain a physical activity program for Latinas. Taynara loves the beach and enjoys spending time with friends, her husband, and her dog – Bella.

Jan M. Hughes-Austin, PT, PhD is an Associate Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery and Director of Patient-Centered Research within the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery. Her research focuses on cardiovascular disease and bone disease; and how these two interact. One area of research investigates the role that autoimmunity, e.g., rheumatoid arthritis (RA)-related autoantibodies play in cardiovascular disease and bone disease, specifically in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (K01 HL122394). Within this cohort, she is evaluating whether an individual’s major histocompatibility complex (MHC) modifies the autoimmunity and CVD link (R03 HL146875). Dr. Hughes-Austin has recently expanded her interest in bone disease to include bone health and fracture pathology, especially in the area of chronic kidney disease mineral bone disorder (CKD-MBD). Her research project (R01 AG065876) aims to establish a biomarker panel that will indicate bone turnover consistent with what is determined on bone biopsy from the hip in patients with hip fracture and CKD.

Nicole Jensky, PhD a California native, received her undergraduate degree in Psychology from UC Santa Barbara with a minor in Health and Exercise Science. After graduating, she continued her education at University of Southern California and graduated with a PhD in Biokinesiology with an emphasis in Exercise Physiology. Her dissertation focused on analyzing skeletal muscle proteins that regulate muscle mass. She completed her T32 postdoctoral fellowship at UC San Diego. Her fellowship training included: obtaining a Masters Degree in Public Health (MPH) with a focus in Epidemiology at San Diego State University, attending conferences and seminars, journal club, writing manuscripts and writing grant proposals. Dr. Jensky's postdoctoral research focused on prevention of cardiovascular disease. She investigated the association between blood pressure measures and calcification in different vascular beds. Also, she investigated the association between body composition and calcification of different vascular beds, and lastly, she analyzed associations between physical activity and body composition as well as inflammatory markers in a diverse population.

After completing her postdoctoral fellowship, Dr. Jensky worked at Cedars Sinai Medical Center as a Research Associate III. In this role, she collaborated with urologists to develop and coordinate a pro-active surveillance research study for low risk prostate cancer patients. Next, Dr. Jensky pursued a career at Allergan as a Therapeutic Neurotoxin Medical Science Liaison (MSL). She served as a liaison between industry and medical researchers for clinical, pre-clinical, and post-marketing studies. She is currently employed at AbbVie as Director, Global Medical & Scientific Content Excellence where she focuses on creation and roll-out of Global Medical Field Resources. The focus includes the planning, development, and roll out of global scientific resources and tools. In her spare time she enjoys spending time with family/friends and exploring new places.

Britta Larsen, PhD is a behavioral science and epidemiology researcher with a focus in behavioral prevention and management of CVD and diabetes. She received her MA and PhD in Experimental Psychology from UC San Diego, with a focus in health and social psychology, and completed the T32 postdoctoral fellowship in Cardiovascular Epidemiology and Behavioral Medicine at the UC San Diego School of Medicine. She has spent the past 12 years conducting clinical trials of physical activity interventions in community and clinical settings with high risk and underserved populations, particularly in Latinx populations. She also studies behavioral and physiological risk factors for chronic disease, including social networks, physical activity, sedentary behavior, and body composition, with a focus on muscle mass. She has expertise in using mediated channels to deliver interventions, including wearables, apps, tailored text messaging, and social media. She is also studying cost effectiveness of physical activity interventions in community and clinical settings, and dissemination and implementation of behavioral interventions in clinical settings. In her spare time, Dr. Larsen enjoys traveling, writing, hiking, cooking, watching football, and spending time with her family.

Sarah Linke, PhD, MPH received a BA in Psychology from Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri, before moving to California to pursue graduate school. She obtained an MS in Clinical Psychology and MPH in Health Promotion from San Diego State University (SDSU) en route to completing her PhD through the SDSU/UCSD Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology within the Behavioral Medicine Track. She completed her Clinical Psychology Internship/Residency at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, before returning to San Diego for a Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health at UC San Diego. She completed her Postdoctoral Fellowship in the NHLBI T32 Integrated Cardiovascular Fellowship Program within the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health (FMPH) at UC San Diego School of Medicine in 2015. She then became a faculty member within FMPH at UC San Diego, where she served as Assistant (2016-2019) and Associate (2019-current) Health Sciences Clinical Professor. In January 2022 she transitioned to an industry position at Omada Health, where she currently serves as the Senior Director of Health Economics and Outcomes Research. Her research focuses on developing, implementing, evaluating, and scaling exercise and other healthy lifestyle behaviors as prevention and/or treatments for a host of chronic diseases and mental and physical health problems. She is also a licensed clinical psychologist within UC San Diego's Integrative Behavioral Health (IBH) Program, where she specializes in behavioral medicine, particularly the role of health behaviors in health problems. In her spare time, Dr. Linke enjoys long-distance running, live music, animals, and spending time in nature.

Morgana Mongraw-Chaffin, PhD, MPH is an epidemiologist and NIH funded investigator with a research focus on the etiology and prevention of obesity and cardiometabolic disease. Her work falls into four major areas: 1. The stability and cardiovascular risk associated with metabolically healthy obesity and other obesity phenotypes, 2. Glucose homeostasis across the life-course with emphasis on the use of continuous glucose monitors as a measurement tool to overcome research barriers, 3. How women’s reproductive and pregnancy factors affect their lifetime risk for cardiometabolic disease and how to leverage pregnancy and postpartum periods as a window of opportunity for primary prevention, and 4. The role of body fat composition in cardiometabolic dysfunction including differences by sex and race/ethnicity. Additional research interests include epidemiological methods for observational studies. Currently, Dr. Mongraw-Chaffin is an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology & Prevention at the Wake Forest School of Medicine.

Karen Moy, PhD was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to the University of Auckland, New Zealand where she earned her doctorate degree in Public Health in 2001. Her research in physical activity and health behaviors among Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders includes the creation and validation of culturally-specific assessment tools and baseline statistics for this understudied, high-risk population. As a grant writer for local nonprofits, Dr. Moy secured over $4 million towards health-related research.  In 2014, Dr. Moy founded local nonprofit, Hearts for San Diego, and since 2018, she's been the Executive Director of Rescue Express.

Jeanean B. Naqvi, Ph.D. received her B.A. in Psychology from UCLA (2014) and her Ph.D. in Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University (2022). Her research interests include racial/ethnic health disparities and elucidating the link between social support and cardiovascular health. During her Ph.D., Jeanean received an F31 from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities to support her dissertation work on race differences in the link between social support and health among Black and White individuals with type 2 diabetes. During her time as a T32 fellow, she expanded upon this prior work by examining racial/ethnic health disparities in cardiovascular health using population health datasets, as well as coordinating data collection and delivery of a digital health intervention to increase physical activity among Latinas in San Diego. She is currently a Clinical Research Scientist at Omada Health, a digital health company that delivers app-based solutions for cardiovascular disease prevention, diabetes, and hypertension.

Laura Pompano Hendrickson, Ph.D. is a global health researcher focused on micronutrient malnutrition domestically and internationally. She received her B.S. in Biochemistry from Virginia Tech and an M.S. in Biological Chemistry from the University of California, Los Angeles. Afterwards, she completed her PhD in Nutritional Science from Cornell University with a focus on how iron deficiency affects physical performance and energy metabolism in university women in China, Rwanda, and the US. She currently is a Senior Micronutrient Specialist at McKing Consulting Corporation working with the International Micronutrient Malnutrition Prevention and Control Team at the US Centers for Disease Control.

Sonia Ponce, MD, MPH is a cardiologist at a community clinic.

Rosemay Remigio-Baker, PhD earned her BS from the University of California on Biochemistry and Cell Biology with a minor in Psychology, and her MPH from San Diego State University. For her thesis, she determined the prevalence of hypertension and diabetes among Filipino women in San Diego and assessed whether the use of antihypertensive medication induced diabetes in this population. Rosemay completed her PhD on Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) Epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health where she evaluated the association between depressive symptoms and body composition, and potential modification by race/ethnicity, sex, overweight/obesity status and neighborhood factors such as physical and social environment. During her doctoral program she earned multiple scholarships and recognition including the Miriam Brailey Award and Charlotte Ferencz Scholarship from the Department of Epidemiology, and the Marilyn Spivak Menkes Award for Personal and Academic Excellence. She also earned a Diversity and Predoctoral Health Disparities Fellowship and a training grant for Clinical Research and Epidemiology in Diabetes and Endocrinology. Her current research includes investigating adverse childhood events, CVD and lung disease among women residing in Hawaii; modification by neighborhood factors of the association between stroke and cognitive function in the Women’s Health Study; health disparities in the vitamin D/calcium and insulin resistance association using the Jackson Heart Study and Atherosclerosis Risk In Communities study; as well as the association between fatty liver and calcific atherosclerosis in the Multi-ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis. She is a member of the American Heart Association Lifestyle and Cardiometabolic Health Early Career Committee, as well as the planning committee for Mental Health Workshops on Asian-Pacific Islander populations provided by the Kalusugan Community Services Center in National City. In her spare time, Dr. Remigio-Baker enjoys spending time with her family, traveling and relaxing at the beach.

Erin Richard, PhD, MPH received her master’s degree in Public Health from San Diego State University and her PhD in Public Health Epidemiology from the UCSD/SDSU joint doctoral program (2020). Her primary research interest is in applying integrated epidemiological, clinical, and genetic data to investigate the underlying factors and processes that contribute to aging and age-related disease. Her dissertation focused on the relationship between biomarkers of kidney function and cognitive performance in older adults. As part of her postdoctoral work, she is conducting several large-scale genome-wide association studies to explore the genetic architecture of diabetic complications and smoking by gene interactions on cardiometabolic traits.

Isac Thomas, MD, MPH was born in Las Vegas, Nevada. He received his undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He then completed residency training in internal medicine at the University of Chicago. From there, Dr. Thomas returned to California where he began training in clinical cardiology at the University of California, San Diego. As a T32 fellow, he received a Master’s degree in Public Health with an emphasis in Epidemiology.  Following a period as a faculty member in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at UC San Diego, he joined the Hawaii Permanente Medical Group in Honolulu, Hawaii as a clinical cardiologist. His research interests include coronary and extra-coronary arterial calcification and associated risks of cardiovascular disease.

Maíra Tristão Parra obtained an undergraduate degree in Sport Sciences from Londrina State University, Londrina, Brazil. She continued her studies in Sports & Health Sciences at the University of Exeter (UK), where she received her Master of Science degree. Her Doctoral training was housed in the Evidence-based Health Graduate Program at the Federal University of São Paulo, Brazil, where she gained expertise in research methods, with an emphasis on systematic reviews for interventions. She was a post-doctoral fellow in the CVD Epi training program and graduated in the MPH program at UC San Diego with a concentration in Epidemiology. Maíra was an Assistant Project Scientist at the Hebert Wertheim School of Public Health and Longevity Sciences and the Assistant Manager at the Exercise and Physical Activity Resource Center (EPARC) for three years. She is currently a Research Analyst in a consulting company assisting clients by generating evidence syntheses to inform public health policies and decision-making.  During her free time, Maíra enjoys swimming, outdoor activities, spending time with family and friends, traveling, and cooking Brazilian food.

Jonathan Unkart, MD is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the School of Medicine at UC San Diego. His clinical and research activities focus on the development and treatment of lower extremity venous and arterial disease. Additionally, Dr. Unkart has a strong research interest in healthy aging and medical education.

Priscilla M. Vásquez, PhD, MPH is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Urban Public Health at Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science. She obtained a BA in Literature from the University of California San Diego (UCSD), and both an MPH in Community Health Sciences and PhD in Kinesiology at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). Her work is anchored in addressing health inequities in cardiovascular health and brain health among underrepresented populations, namely Latina/o adults. She aims to use epidemiologic evidence to inform community-based interventions. Her research interests include cardiovascular disease, cognitive function, social environments, and physical activity among middle-aged and older Latina/o adults. 

Pre-Docs

Maggie Crawford, PhD studied nutrition and physiology at UC Berkeley and was pursuing professional mountaineering when she was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. She is an alumni of the UCSD-SDSU Joint Doctoral Program in Public Health and was a pre-doctoral fellow in the UCSD Integrated Cardiovascular Epidemiology Fellowship. She now works at Dexcom as a Senior Manager of Behavioral & Translational Data Science and is passionate about using data to help people self-learn and manage their health. In her free time she surfs, skis, and climbs with her husband, kids, and puppy.

Erin Delker, PhD is a lecturer at San Diego State School of Public Health and a Reproductive Epidemiologist at the California Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment. During her time in the T32, Erin earned her PhD in Epidemiology from the UC San Diego and San Diego State Joint Doctoral Program in Public Health. Her dissertation examined the effects of preconception blood pressure and glycemia on adverse pregnancy and birth outcomes. Prior to joining the T32, Erin earned an MPH in Sociomedical Science from Columbia University and a BA in Psychology from George Washington.

Eric T. Hyde, M.P.H. earned his Bachelor of Science in Movement Science from the University of Michigan (2014) and Master of Public Health in Epidemiology from Emory University (2017) before working for three years as an epidemiologist in the Physical Activity and Health Branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While there, he worked on national surveillance of physical activity and sedentary behavior while contributing to federal policy documents such as the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, 2nd edition and the National Youth Sports Strategy. Eric began the T32 Integrated Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology Predoctoral Fellowship in 2020, which was the same year he began the SDSU/UCSD joint doctoral program in Public Health – Epidemiology. Eric’s primary research interests are in the measurement of physical activity and sedentary behavior. In addition, he’s interested the associations between physical activity/sedentary behavior and chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease and cancer, as well as interventions that promote a physically active lifestyle.

Jessica Jimenez, PhD is an Assistant Professor in Department of Psychology at National University. Prior to joining National University, Dr. Jiménez led global health program evaluations and managed study teams as a Senior Advisor for Evaluation and Research at an international non-governmental organization. As a Fulbright scholar in Oaxaca, Mexico, Dr. Jiménez studied the effects of out-migration on women’s physical and mental health. Dr. Jimenez is a graduate of SDSU/UCSD Joint Doctoral Program in Public Health, Health Behavior. As a T32 pre-doctoral fellow in cardiovascular epidemiology, Dr. Jiménez conducted her doctoral work, under Dr. Paul Mills in the Department of Psychiatry, on the underlying neuroimmune mechanisms between depression and morbidity and mortality risk in Heart Failure patients.  She has published in the areas of psychoneuroimmunology, health psychology, and cardiovascular health disparities in underserved populations.

Jessica McCurley, PhD, MPH is a clinical health psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychology at San Diego State University (SDSU). Dr. McCurley received her Ph.D. from the SDSU/UC San Diego Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology and her M.P.H. in Epidemiology from SDSU. She completed her Postdoctoral Fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Dr. McCurley’s research utilizes community-based participatory methods and implementation science to develop and evaluate interventions that promote healthy behaviors, address social determinants of health, and reduce disparities in cardiometabolic diseases (e.g., obesity, type 2 diabetes) and depression. Dr. McCurley’s current NIH-funded studies involve developing a telehealth intervention to reduce depression and increase physical activity in low-wage hospital service workers and evaluating the implementation of a Massachusetts state health policy to address food and housing insecurity in Medicaid patients.   

Gina Merchant, PhD is a National Library of Medicine Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California San Diego in the Division of Biomedical Informatics, Department of Medicine, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health. She also lectures at California State San Marcos. Her undergraduate and master’s degrees are in Psychology, and her doctorate is in Public Health with an emphasis on Health Behavior. Dr. Merchant's research is at the intersection of psychology, public health informatics, and data science. Her work broadly examines how online and offline social networks influence our health behaviors and healthcare decision-making. Dr. Merchant quantitatively and qualitatively investigates how spending time on social media platforms, creating and engaging with content, affects our health. She seeks to uncover methods to conduct large-scale content analysis of unstructured text data that is exchanged in online networks. Once we are able to interpret these data, she believes we will have a better understanding of how to intervene in virtual spaces to promote health-enhancing behaviors, and better predict who is at risk for health impairing behaviors. Dr. Merchant's work aims to discover ways to leverage social media and other Web 2.0 technologies to improve individuals’ health, and better understand how on- and offline social networks synergistically/antagonistically influence health attitudes and behaviors. Dr. Merchant is active in the R community, and is an advocate for increasing diversity in coding, especially among women in the behavioral and social sciences. In her spare time, Dr. Merchant enjoys playing soccer, running, cooking, gardening, and hanging out with her family.

Lorena S. Pacheco, Ph.D. received her doctoral degree in Epidemiology from the University of California San Diego-San Diego State University Joint Doctoral Program in Public Health. Her research interests include nutrition and chronic disease prevention, particularly cardiometabolic disease prevention, metabolomics, and dietary interventions. She is a practicing bilingual and multicultural registered dietitian nutritionist, having worked with a number of community-based health initiatives in diverse populations in the U.S. and Latin America, as a dietitian and research collaborator. She is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s Department of Nutrition and is working on several nutritional epidemiological projects including analyses of the Nurse’s Health Studies, Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, and several Hispanic/Latino cohorts, and interventions related to diet, behavior, mindfulness, and planetary health. Lorena also works with the Childhood Obesity Intervention Cost-Effectiveness (CHOICES) Study and Teaching Kitchen Collaborative teams.

Kimberly Savin, MS, MPH obtained her PhD in the SDSU/UC San Diego Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology. During this time, she was a predoctoral fellow in the UC San Diego CVD/Epi T32. Kimberly is currently completing a postdoctoral residency at the VA Greater Los Angeles in primary care mental health integration and behavioral sleep medicine. Her research interests are in understanding relationships between sleep and cardiometabolic health to inform interventions on both. She is also interested in studying social determinants of cardiometabolic health and health behaviors to reduce health inequities.

Smriti Shivpuri, MA, PhD received her BS in Psychology and French from The Ohio State University, her MA in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from Michigan State University, her Masters in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology from San Diego State University, and her PhD under the mentorship of Dr. Linda Gallo and Dr. Matt Allison through the Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology at San Diego State University/University of California San Diego. She completed her clinical internship at the Alpert Medical School at Brown University, and is currently a Program Manager in Primary Care- Mental Health Integration at the Jesse Brown Veteran's Affairs Medical Center in Chicago, IL. Her research interests include psychosocial factors related to cardiovascular disease risk in minority populations, with a special focus on the effect of stress.