Maria C. Canino, Ph.D., is a postdoctoral fellow at the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements (ODS). Her overall interest focuses on health, human performance, and musculoskeletal injury through an integrative approach that combines exercise physiology and neurophysiology. In her role at the ODS, she aims to expand her work into nutrition and dietary supplements, leveraging her experience to enhance the understanding of health, performance optimization, and recovery across the lifespan. Her efforts will help address critical gaps in musculoskeletal health and dietary supplement use, particularly in military and premilitary populations.
Prior to joining ODS, Dr. Canino gained extensive experience in human performance research across diverse populations, including the general public, athletes, and military service members. As an Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education fellow at the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine from 2015 to 2019, she contributed to the development of the Occupational Physical Assessment Test , a standardized physical employment test for Army recruits. She was also involved with research that explored relationships between physical fitness, occupational performance, and musculoskeletal injury in service members.
During her doctoral training, Dr. Canino explored the bidirectional interactions between the brain and musculoskeletal system in vivo using advanced techniques to understand the central mechanisms that govern human performance and the brain’s response to musculoskeletal injury. She also contributed to research on the neuroendocrine stress response system and used various physiological markers to explore its role in regulating physical performance and recovery.
She received her B.S. in exercise science and her M.S. in exercise physiology from Illinois State University and her Ph.D. in rehabilitation science from the University of Pittsburgh.