Areas of Specialty:
Cellular senescence
Response to stress
Biomarkers of aging
Viviana Perez Montes
National Institute on Aging, United States
Dr. Perez serves as the Director of the Division of Aging Biology at the National Institute on Aging (NIA), National Institutes of Health (NIH). She obtained her B.S. and M.S. in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from the University of Chile, followed by a Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the same institution, where her research focused on the role of T-kininogen in cell proliferation and aging. Dr. Perez completed her postdoctoral fellowship at The Barshop Institute for Aging in San Antonio under Dr. Arlan Richardson, continuing her training investigating the oxidative stress theory of aging. Her achievements include receiving the Ellison Medical Foundation/AFAR Senior Postdoctoral Award and the Ellison Medical Foundation New Scholar in Aging. In 2011, she joined the Linus Pauling Institute and the Department of Biochemistry at Oregon State University as an Assistant Professor. Her research emphasized: 1) elucidating the mechanism of Rapamycin’s effects on longevity in mice, 2) investigating the role of Nrf2 in cellular senescence, 3) exploring proteostasis in long-lived species, and 4) studying cellular senescence in Alzheimer’s disease. Dr. Perez held leadership roles such as Chair and Past Chair of the Biological Science Section at the GSA, organized the section’s annual meeting in 2021, and participated in several study sections at NIA/NIH. She was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure, and her research was continuously funded by NIA until her transition to NIA as a Program Officer in 2020. In this capacity, she served as Program Director and Program Coordinator for the Cellular Senescence Common Fund (SenNet). In 2022, Dr. Perez served as Vice President of Geroscience at the Hevolution Foundation, where she played a pivotal role in establishing and leading a research funding organization in the private/corporate sector.