Heather Basara Richter completed her PhD in the College of Public Health at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. She applied computational and geospatial technologies to study the spatial and temporal relationships between determinants of health and patterns of chronic and infectious disease outcomes. Following graduate school, Dr. Basara joined the University of Oklahoma with a joint faculty appointment in the Center for Applied Social Research and the Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability. As an academic, she held associate faculty appointments in the Stephenson Cancer Center and the College of Public Health. She currently volunteers as one of the founding board members for the Cancer Pain Research Consortium, as a panel reviewer for NIH, and works as a scientific consultant.
Dr. Basara has been successfully funded by NIH through R21 and Clinical and Translational Science awards. She was named a Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust Scholar for her work in cancer prevention and control in Native American populations. These awards provided significant opportunity to develop research partnerships and infrastructure for collaborative multidisciplinary clinical and scientific investigations. A veteran of large-scale scientific initiatives, Dr. Basara has extensive experience in research design, scientific planning and administration. Dr. Basara is married to Erich Richter; has acquired the surname Richter along with six children and several pets.