Angela Zhang

Angela graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2021 with a degree in Mathematics of Computation and a minor in Environmental Systems.

Most recently, she was an Emerson National Hunger Fellow at Just Harvest in Pittsburgh and The Brookings Institution. At Just Harvest, she conducted research and authored a report published by the Congressional Hunger Center. The report outlined a process for nonprofits and scholars to co-create food access solutions with community members affected by food apartheid in Pittsburgh and has been adopted by a number of community groups in the area.

Angela has also been a research assistant on studies at UCLA and the Harvard Chan School of Public Health. Specifically, she has researched the impact of behavioral nudges on plant-based meal selection as well as the nutritional relevance of aquatic foods such as seaweeds to public health.

While in the Population, Health, and Place program, Angela plans to utilize systems science approaches to advance knowledge on the linkages between food insecurity, the built environment and individual behavior. She also hopes to incorporate participatory methods into her work as a scholar and advocate.

B.S., Mathematics, Minor in Environmental Systems, University of California, Los Angeles

Boronowsky, R., Zhang, A., Stecher, C., Presley, K., Mathur, M., Cleveland, D., Garnett, E.,
Wharton, C., Meier, A., Brown, D., Wang, M., Braverman, I., & Jay, J (2022). Plant-based
default nudges effectively increase the sustainability of catered meals on college campuses:
Three randomized controlled trials. Front. Sustain. Food Syst. doi:
10.3389/fsufs.2022.1001157