Noventa Millas: Migration history, genomic ancestry, and health disparities among Cuban immigrants and Cuban-Americans in the United States

Immigrants are arriving in the United States at an unprecedented rate, with variation in experiences of adversity during and following immigration to this country. Such adverse social experiences have been linked to the development of poor health. My post-doctoral project will investigate how the process of immigration and assimilation are associated with mental health and biological aging within immigrants that arrived to the United States within the last six years (since January 1, 2019). I will do this through a longitudinal study following 100 immigrants living in the United States across one year. I will investigate two questions: 1) How does baseline mental health and biomarkers of aging vary relative to immigration and adverse social experiences for recently arrived immigrants? And 2) How do experiences of structural and informal support influence mental health and biological aging within the first year of living in a new country? This research aims to elucidate mechanistic links between immigration experiences, mental health, and biological aging using validated mental health assessments, ethnographic interviews, and molecular biomarkers of aging. Additionally, the inclusion of social support as a metric in evaluating health outcomes moves this project toward solution-oriented research, in which identifying specific forms of support could help in bolstering these networks and resources across all populations in the United States.