Natasia Courchesne-Krak, PhD, MPH, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego, specializing in psychiatric genetics and the health impacts of substance use disorders, with a particular focus on pregnant women, children, and adolescents. Her research integrates psychiatry, epidemiology, clinical psychology, pediatrics, and genetics to examine how biological and environmental factors shape substance use disorders and related health outcomes. She leverages electronic health records and large-scale datasets to study the intersections of substance use, healthcare utilization, and maternal and child health.
As part of the Collaborative Initiative on Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (CIFASD), she investigated the neurodevelopmental consequences of prenatal exposure to alcohol, stimulants, cannabis, opioids, and nicotine. Building on this work, her research now focuses on the sex-specific genetic architecture of nicotine, alcohol, and opioid use, as well as externalizing behaviors across diverse populations. She also investigates genetic and biological mechanisms underlying maternal substance use and its impact on maternal and child morbidity in multi-ancestry cohorts. In addition, she serves as a Co-Investigator for the Healthy Brain and Child Development (HBCD) Study, a national longitudinal study of early brain development and the effects of prenatal and postnatal exposures.
Over the next decade, she aims to identify genetic, biological, and environmental mechanisms underlying substance use and its impact on morbidity and mortality across the lifespan. The ultimate goal of her work is to inform prevention and intervention strategies that improve outcomes for vulnerable populations.