Dr. Jinae Roa is a native of southern California, growing up in Long Beach, CA. She received her BS in Biology from UC Santa Barbara and her MS in Biology from CSU Long Beach where her research focused on muscle physiology of marine fish. She continued her research at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, where she received a PhD in Marine Biology with a focus on comparative physiology and intracellular signaling. Dr. Roa then served as an NSF- and NIH-funded post-doctoral scholar at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, and UC San Diego School of Medicine. She is currently an Assistant Professor at Cal State LA in the Department of Biological Sciences.