Milena A. Melo is a broadly trained cultural and medical anthropologist whose work focuses on immigration, health care inequalities, the U.S-Mexico borderlands, citizenship and public policy. Motivated by her own experience as a DACA recipient and undocumented immigrant, Professor Melo is committed to conducting research that reduces barriers to health care, confronts social inequality and combats the disenfranchisement faced by marginalized populations in the United States. Professor Melo graduated with her Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Texas at San Antonio in 2017. She is currently a tenure-track assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.