she's originally from Miami. Her parents worked a million jobs so she ended up mothering her 4 younger brothers until she graduated high school at 16, got emancipated, and went off on scholarship to Duke, where she studied biomedical engineering, then med school at Johns Hopkins, general surgery residency, trauma surgery fellowship. sprinkled in all that was discovery of her powers at puberty and various escalations in ability and power level as she experimented through college/med school/etc. She's been part of the Sentinels for a couple years now, still works as a surgeon when not Sentinel-ing, and volunteers at various free/low-cost clinics around the city because she has a deeply-held belief that having her abilities means she has a responsibility to use them to benefit as many people as possible who couldn't otherwise afford quality care or whom modern medicine couldn't fully help.
Personality-wise, she's pretty intense - most of her energy goes into her work and if there weren't like, labor laws and concerned friends she might go until she dropped. She's slow to warm up to people or to trust, but once you're in, you're in and there's not a lot she wouldn't do for her close friends.