Dr. Eda Akyar is a resident physician at Columbia University Medical Center in New York. She completed medical school at Loyola University Chicago, Stritch School of Medicine and graduated in 2018. She is in the Global Health Honors and Research Honors Programs. Her research focuses on infectious disease transmission and community health, with projects including Hepatitis C infection in Ghana and the use of dental varnishes among pediatric populations in Chicago. Eda has a strong interest in the intersection of medicine and social justice.

Eda graduated from the Science and Humanities Scholars Program at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) with a Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences and a minor in Chemistry.

After her undergraduate years, Eda completed a Fulbright Fellowship in Indonesia where she taught English to 10th and 11th grade students in Tana Toraja. Following her Fulbright, Eda earned a Master of Public Health from Yale University with a focus on the Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases.