Claudia Lugo-Candelas, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist specializing in the perinatal programming of risk and resilience for neurodevelopment disorders and head of the LUGO LAB at Columbia University. She obtained a B.A. from the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras, a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and completed her clinical internship at the NYC Health + Hospitals/Lincoln. Dr. Lugo-Candelas completed a postdoctoral research fellowship in the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Division in 2018. That same year she joined the faculty and in 2020 was named the Bender-Fishbein Scholar in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. Dr. Lugo-Candelas’ overarching research interest is to better understand the early development of inhibitory control difficulties, particularly within developmental disorders such as ADHD. She is particularly committed to understanding the exposures and experiences that are most relevant to communities that are minoritized, underserved, and underrepresented. Her work is funded by the NIH, NARSAD, and various Columbia University pilot awards. At the heart of her mission is the strongly held belief that diversity and equity are indispensable to the development of sound science and public health. Mentorship and training are core missions of her lab, with the aim of increasing access to higher education and increasing the representation of minoritized communities within the STEM fields, particularly psychiatry and neuroscience.