Christa Wright, Ph.D., is the Director of the Center for Toxicology & Human Health within UL Research Institutes’ Chemical Insights. Her work aims to unravel particle and chemical-mediated molecular mechanisms that cause cellular phenotypic changes, which may lead to disease development. She uses cutting-edge instrumentation to link chemical and particle emission exposures from various consumer products to adverse cellular outcomes using a systems biology approach. 

Christa received a Ph.D. in Energy and Environmental Systems with a minor in Environmental Toxicology and an MS in Cancer Biology from North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro, North Carolina. After graduate school, she completed a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute postdoctoral training fellowship at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She previously served as an assistant professor at Georgia State University, where she taught undergraduate and graduate students. She currently serves as a standing member of the National Institutes of Health study section, Environmental Determinants of Disease. She is the 2024 recipient of the Black Engineer of the Year Award for Outstanding Technical Innovation in Industry. 

ORCiD: 0000-0002-5950-9026