Suraiya graduated from UC Berkeley in 2017 with degrees in Neurobiology and Public Health. Her love of the underwater world led her to pursue diving, first as a hobby, and later as a career. She received her first scuba diving certification in 2010 and her first freediving certification in 2021. Suraiya is now pursuing her Ph.D. at UCLA, investigating the effects of freediving on our bodies, brains, and communities. She is specifically interested in the effects of freediving on physiological and psychological mechanisms related to health and wellbeing. Suraiya plans to harness knowledge about these mechanisms to develop novel diving-inspired therapeutic health interventions.

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