Denise is a Mexican Indigenous Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Center for Toxicology and Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health at The University of Arizona (UA). Her research focuses on understanding how volatile organic compounds interact in workplace air and impact low-wage, minority workers in small business beauty salons and auto shops in Tucson, Arizona. In this training position, she focuses on strengthening and expanding her skills in exposure science, biostatistical modeling, and qualitative methods. Overall, she wants to disrupt the traditional notion of who has the privilege to implement projects in environmental justice communities. Before this position, Denise obtained her Ph.D. from the UA Department of Environmental Science and the School of Anthropology. She implemented a community-engaged oral history project where she preserved the personal histories of 22 individuals living and working near two Superfund sites in Arizona. Her project culminated in the digital archive, Voices Unheard: Arizona’s Environmental History. She is currently a National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences T32 Postdoctoral fellow and was a 2016-2020 Superfund Research Center Trainee. For fun, Denise likes to explore nature through hiking, running, and birding. She also enjoys eating food with her family in Ambos Nogales, only 45 minutes away.
