Dr. Edmarie Guzmán-Vélez
Dr. Edmarie Guzmán-Vélez
Postdoctoral Fellow Massachusetts General Hospital / Harvard Medical School
PhD in Clinical Psychology University of Iowa
One day, while in high school, a girl named Edmarie walked into a bookstore in a small beach town in the coast of Puerto Rico. As she picked up a book titled “A Complete Idiot’s Guide to Psychology” and began to read, the scientific seed was planted that would ultimately give life to her career as a brain scientist. Today, Edmarie Guzmán-Vélez has a PhD in Clinical Psychology with a specialty in neuropsychology, and she studies early biomarkers of Alzheimer’s Disease at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Edmarie Guzmán-Vélez was born and raised in Isabela, a small beach town in the west coast of Puerto Rico. None of her family or friends were scientists. For college she went to the University of Puerto Rico in San Juan. There, she majored in Psychology and joined an undergraduate research program known as Career Opportunities in Research, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health. This program facilitated research internships in neuropsychology for Edmarie. Her first research experience was studying language in humans at the University of Iowa in the lab of Dr. Daniel Tranel. Later, Edmarie returned to Iowa to pursue a doctoral degree in Clinical Psychology where, under the guidance of Dr. Tranel, she investigated how memory and emotions dissociate in Alzheimer’s disease.
Edmarie is simply fearless. During graduate school she began a new branch of research in the laboratory of her advisor. In the Tranel Lab, they hadn’t studied Alzheimer’s disease at all, but her quest to understand emotions and memory loss was strong. Edmarie created research protocols, established collaborations and even obtained funding in order to complete her doctoral thesis. Her doctoral work demonstrated that emotions caused by an event linger for a long time even when patients cannot remember the emotion-inducing event, thus suggesting that emotions and declarative memory can be dissociated.
Today, Edmarie is a postdoctoral fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School in the laboratory of Dr. Yakeel Quiroz-Gaviria. Her postdoctoral research focuses on identifying early biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease by studying individuals with a dominant gene for Alzheimer’s disease who have not developed cognitive symptoms yet (i.e. they are in the preclinical stage). She also recently started studying how aerobic fitness levels may modify the progression of Alzheimer's disease (e.g., neurodegeneration, cognitive decline, accumulation of pathology). She uses neuroimaging, cognitive and VO2 max tests (to measure fitness) to address her scientific questions.
In addition to her research training, Edmarie trained in clinical neuropsychology in programs such as the Benton neuropsychology clinic, Boston VA, and the MGH multicultural neuropsychology program where she conducted in-depth neuropsychological batteries to individuals with diverse neurological and psychiatric disorders. She is married to a neuroscientist, Dr. Hector De Jesús-Cortés, and they love cooking for friends and traveling. Edmarie is extremely driven and has tremendous grit as evidenced by her research and clinical track record, yet she comes across as poised and exudes calmness. Perhaps her poise comes from years dancing as a child and teenager, and her calmness from her clinical psychology training. Yet, as is often seen in academia, Edmarie too experienced the stress and anxiety of graduate school, especially at the beginning when she was struggling with the cultural change and adjusting to speaking English. Edmarie’s graduate mentor was instrumental in her success and gave her a lot of positive feedback and encouragement; this positive reinforcement kept Edmarie going during tough times in graduate school. She also made sure that she engaged in activities that she valued, such as visiting her family and dancing, to avoid burnout. Her main advice for younger students is to not get caught in the feeling that nothing you do is ever enough, and to every now and then take a step back to recognize the big picture and admire your accomplishments.
Listen to Nancy’s full interview with Edmarie on November 9th, 2018 below!
