Lorena Pacheco

Dr. Lorena S. Pacheco is a research scientist in the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, where she focuses on diet and lifestyle behaviors to help prevent cardiometabolic diseases. 

She earned her B.S. in Food Science and Dietetics and her Master’s in Public Health Epidemiology from San Diego State University. Dr. Pacheco completed her Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Public Health Epidemiology at UC San Diego/San Diego State University (Joint Doctoral Program) in 2019 while being a T32 Predoctoral Fellow in Integrated Cardiovascular Epidemiology at UC San Diego. She joined the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in 2020 as a T32 postdoctoral fellow in Research Training Grant in Academic Nutrition and Yerby Fellowship mentee.

As a nutritional epidemiologist, Dr. Pacheco brings together insights from large population studies and practical interventions to better understand and support healthier lives. She leads multiple epidemiologic studies using the Channing cohorts—including the Nurses’ Health Study I and II and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study—to examine the relationships between dietary intake, food-related behaviors, and chronic disease risk. Additionally, she collaborates with Dr. Josiemer Mattei on the Puerto Rico Observational Study of Psychosocial, Environmental, and Chronic Disease Trends (PROSPECT), a longitudinal study, examining food consumed away from home, cooking and food preparation behaviors, eating practices, and cardiometabolic risk among adults in Puerto Rico. 

Dr. Pacheco is also the Principal Investigator of several grants, including a NHLBI-funded K01 award aimed at developing and testing a Teaching Kitchen intervention to improve cardiometabolic health among Hispanic/Latino adults. By combining research and real-world solutions, Dr. Pacheco aims to create meaningful and practical ways to improve nutrition and health at both the individual and community level.