Rafael Pérez-Escamilla

Rafael Pérez-Escamilla (email) obtained his BS in Chemical Engineering from the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City, and his masters in food science and PhD in nutrition from the University of California at Davis. He is the Principal Investigator and Director of the Connecticut Center of Excellence for Eliminating Health Disparities among Latinos (CEHDL), and a Professor of Nutritional Sciences and Public Health at the University of Connecticut. He also holds the title of Nutrition Extension Scientist for the State of Connecticut and a joint appointment with the Department of Community Medicine and Health Care (MPH program) at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington. Dr. Pérez-Escamilla is an internationally recognized scholar in the areas of domestic and international community nutrition. He is currently leading or co-leading four interdisciplinary capacity building projects, two in Connecticut (CEHDL and Hispanic Family Nutrition Program), one in Ghana (Research to Improve Infant Nutrition and Growth in HIV affected communities (RIING)) and Brazil (national household food security measurement project). He has published 90 scientific research articles in peer reviewed journals and over 200 conference proceeding abstracts, book chapters, and technical reports. His breastfeeding, food security, nutrition education, obesity, type 2 diabetes, and food safety research work has taken him to Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Senegal, South Korea, Spain, and throughout the USA. He teaches courses in community nutrition, nutritional epidemiology, and nutrition during humanitarian emergencies. He has been the principal mentor to over 30 graduate students from all over the world who are currently working in prestigious positions in academia, government, international organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGO’s), and industry. Dr. Pérez-Escamilla’s work has been continuously supported with over $15 million in extramural funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), The US Department of Agriculture (USDA), The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and The Patrick & Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation. He has been a senior scientific advisor to maternal-child health & nutrition projects funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF), The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), The World Bank, The World Health Organization (WHO), and USDA. Dr. Pérez-Escamilla has also been a senior advisor in food and nutrition policy to the governments of Mexico and Brazil. He is an advisory board member of the University of Texas-El Paso Hispanic Health Disparities Research Center, and the Hispanic Health Council Latino Policy Institute. He is past-chair of the Community and Public Health Nutrition Research Interest Section of the American Society for Nutritional Sciences. Dr. Pérez-Escamilla is a former member of the Executive Committee of ISRHML. He served as a member of the University of Connecticut-Storrs Human Subjects Institutional Review Board (IRB). He currently serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Human Lactation, and the Journal of Hunger and Environmental Nutrition and previously served on the editorial board of the Journal of Nutrition. Dr. Pérez-Escamilla has served on Federal grant review panels and has been an ad-hoc reviewer for over 20 scientific journals in his field. He has received numerous professional awards and recognitions and is currently serving on the National Academies Institute of Medicine (IOM)/National Research Council (NRC) committee in charge of re-examining the current IOM Pregnancy Weight Gain Guidelines.