David Black

David Black is an Associate Professor of Population and Public Health Sciences at the Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California. He serves as Director of the American Mindfulness Research Association and Associate Director of Education at the USC Center for Mindfulness Science.

• PhD in Preventive Medicine (USC)
• MPH in Public Health (USC)

His research focuses on mindfulness-based interventions for substance use disorders, stress reduction, and health behavior modification. Key areas include:

• Mindfulness mechanisms in addiction recovery
• Neurobiological pathways (sympathetic nervous system, gene expression)
• Mobile health applications for smoking cessation
• Stress biomarkers in ethnic minority youth

Recent publications examine mindfulness technology, mindfulness-sleep relationships, and mindfulness-genome interactions. Notable awards include NIH grants and USC Mentoring Awards (2015, 2022). He co-leads a NIH-funded clinical trial for app-based smoking cessation statewide in California and mentors students in behavioral medicine and prevention science.