Speaker Details

Biomedical Researcher

Website:

http://www.ihmc.us/groups/dkernagis/

About Dawn Kernagis

Dr. Dawn Kernagis is a Research Scientist studying ways to optimizing human performance in extreme environments, including undersea, at altitude, and in space. Her team’s current research efforts are funded through several DoD agencies and NASA.

Dawn came to IHMC from Duke University Medical Center, where she was an American Heart Association Postdoctoral Fellow and funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) to identify mechanisms and potential therapeutic targets for acute brain injury. She completed her PhD at Duke University as ONR Undersea Medicine’s first Predoctoral Award recipient. As a graduate student, Dawn also assisted with numerous DoD and NASA-funded projects focused on extreme environmental physiology.

Dawn was also a diver and manager of numerous underwater exploration, research, and conservation projects around the world from 1993-2007, including the deep underwater exploration of Wakulla Springs and surrounding caves for over a decade. In 2016, Dawn was selected as one of six crew members to live and conduct research while living underwater with NASA’s undersea mission, NEEMO 21.Based on her extensive exploration, mentorship, and experience in diving and in the extreme environment research community, she was selected as an inductee into the Women Divers Hall of Fame (Class of 2016) and as a Fellow National of The Explorers Club. In 2018, she received the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society’s Young Scientist Award.