Rae Anne Martinez
Rae Anne Martinez is currently an Epidemiology PhD candidate at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. Martinez was a Flinn Foundation Scholar at the University of Arizona, where she received her B.S. in Molecular and Cellular Biology and a B.A. in Sociology in 2014.
Martinez aims to integrate expertise in biological and social disciplines to understand how social-structural determinants are embodied during critical periods of childhood and may result in later-life health disparities of chronic conditions. Specifically, her dissertation research focuses on accelerated biological aging as an embodiment mechanism linking childhood adversity to later-life depression using a structural equation modeling approach and data from Add Health and the Detroit Neighborhood Health Study. A cross-cutting theme throughout her work is the exploration of how historical and contemporary conceptualizations of race and ethnicity impact epidemiologic methods, scientific communication, and our ability as population health scholars to form a rigorous evidence base.