Devon Payne-Sturges, DrPH

Devon Payne-Sturges, DrPH, is a Professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health in Ann Arbor. She previously held positions as an Associate Professor with the Department of Global, Environmental, and Occupational Health at the University of Maryland School of Public Health and a joint appointment in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Maryland Baltimore School of Medicine.

Previously, Dr. Payne-Sturges served as Assistant Commissioner for Environmental Health with the Baltimore City Health Department and later as Assistant Center Director for Human Health with the United States EPA’s National Center for Environmental Research. During her time at the EPA, she focused on biomonitoring for policy analysis, cumulative risk assessment, health impact assessment, environmental health indicator development, children’s environmental health, and the environmental health of minority populations.

Dr. Payne-Sturges works at the intersection of environmental health, racial equity, and social policy. Her research focuses on racial and economic disparities in exposure to environmental contaminants and associated health risks with the aim of improving the science our society uses to make decisions about environmental policies that impact the health of communities and populations, especially low-income, and minority populations. She is currently conducting research applying systems modeling to better understand the links between structural racism, cumulative environmental exposures, and neurodevelopment health outcomes among children, and respiratory health outcomes among migrant farmworkers.

Dr. Payne-Sturges’ research has been supported with funding from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (K01 and R01), Environmental Defense Fund, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, and UMD’s VPR. Dr. Payne-Sturges earned her MPH and DrPH degrees in environmental health sciences from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.