Dr. Hong was born and raised in South Korea. After she obtained a master’s degree in exercise psychology at University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, she received her doctorate in the areas of psychoneuroimmunology and exercise immunology from the University of Georgia. She completed her post-doctoral training in psychoneuroimmunology and behavioral medicine research in the UCSD Department of Psychiatry. Dr. Hong’s research interests include neuroendocrine and immune cell activation, exercise and immune system activation and adaptation, and inflammation and its cognitive and psychological impact. Her NIH-funded studies focus on immune cell activation and endothelial inflammation under sympathoadrenal activation among prehypertensive individuals and their implications for vascular pathology. She has been and is the PI of a number of other grants and a co-investigator of NIH-funded studies with their focuses on inflammation and depression in heart failure, effects of a TaiChi intervention in heart failure, and immune activation and neurocognitive impairment in HIV patients. Dr. Hong utilizes various cellular immunology methods in her research and is the Director of UCSD Hillcrest Flow Cytometry and Cellular Immunology Core.