Entrepreneurship & Risk taking

Many aspects of San Francisco are exaggerated whether to the positive or the negative, but one element that is accurate, and I believe a positive, is the pervasiveness of the entrepreneurial spirit. No matter the coffee shop, the people at 3 of the 4 other tables are talking about their startup. Philosophically and culturally, I was brought up to believe that thinking differently and taking thoughtful risk is beneficial to society and a big driver of the U.S. economy. It was therefore serendipitous to find that Barcelona has one of the most entrepreneurial cultures in Europe and that biotech is the leading sector. The virtuous cycle of the ecosystem is fed by several international research centers, Spain’s leading universities and a highly educated, global workforce. Diving into this world as a newly arrived high school student was daunting, but I summoned my courage, asked a lot of questions and worked really hard to add value even though I was far and away the youngest person. My effort in the University of Barcelona Biology department served as a reference for IBEC which in turn enabled me to secure and succeed at the Almirall position. 

My confidence that I can add value is growing. At Almirall, I learned the best in class methodologies associated with drug discovery and building regulatorily sound, repeatable process for research and production. My Perot Jain internship company, Life Magnetics, sits between the primary stage research I have done at UB/IBEC and the mature scaling of Almirall. I am able to add value having worked at those other stages of corporate maturity and am learning how to help a company refine its portfolio and scale its business. Professionally, I can see the value in both large company and start-up experiences. I am eager to keep learning in a range of environments to broaden my knowledge base and assemble the deepest skill set possible so that I can drive impact through innovation. 
 

Community Focus & Applied Experience

I have a toggle in my brain in terms of my ability to be “clinical” and empathetic. I can definitely cry over the movies or television commercials, but I am equally a quiet center of calm in a crisis. While sometimes it can be easier for doctors to mitigate their own pain by switching off their emotions, that can inhibit patient care. It is important to see patients as human, honoring the vulnerability and remembering to slow down, be approachable, understand a complex cultural dynamic, smile or squeeze a hand. I have been able, albeit in limited interactions, to practice both modalities in clinical environments such as when I was interning in Romania. I am actively seeking more clinical experience over the next few semesters.
 

Global View

Growing up bi-racial in San Francisco, I thought I had a pretty good grasp of multiculturalism, so it was very humbling to move to Spain and basically speak 1 ½ languages (English fluently, Spanish proficiently), when most of my classmates spoke 3-5 languages fluently and many had lived in 4-6 countries. In that environment, you can either double down on your identity as an American and a foreigner, or you can step up to the challenge and immerse yourself in the local culture and figure out how your friends have navigated their international experiences. Immersion is more than Interrailing through Europe, although that helps. It is spending time at your friends’ homes and seeing their traditions and speaking to their parents in Spanish, which may well be your only common language. It is eating their favorite foods and understanding the politics and economics of their home countries. It is also being attuned to different educational models (IB is very different from the Quaker model). It is understanding different working norms. In Spain, riding the bus to work with your boss is terrifying, but also an incredible opportunity to get to know them personally and professionally. But no email after 8 pm. Being attuned to these spoken and unspoken norms has been critical. I am keen to bring my global mindset to my career and to keep learning. 

Professionalism & Program Management

During my 12 week (30+ hours/week) summer internship (2024) at Almirall, I worked in the the Molecular and Cell Biology (MCB) team which is the in vitro experimental engine of Almirall research, responsible for
driving the development of cell models and assays for new target identification, validation, and the advancement of drug discovery programs. At the end of the summer, my advisor let me know that they had never had an undergraduate intern before, and were actually somewhat skeptical that I could add value in such a short period and without having completed my undergrad, but had been willing to take me on based on my prior references at IBEC and UB. During my internship, I performed a variety tasks including running cell-based assays to assess the functional effects of key compounds from the projects, utilizing different cell-based models such as primary keratinocytes and immortalizing T cell lines, and employing a range of assay technologies such as flow cytometry and TR-FRET. Happily, over the course of the summer I was able to take on more and more responsibility beyond just executing established lab processes. I ultimately authored the companywide  documentation for several novel processes and even designed my own experiments. The highlight was presenting my experiments to my supervisor and the full lab.  My position exposed me to the rigors of working in a professional lab focused on drug delivery in a highly regulated industry. My working norms needed to support that level of precision and regulation.

My internship with Life Magnetics and the UM Center for Entrepreneurship has given me visibility into working on the incubation of biotech product offerings conducting market and clinical research. On my current project we are conducting market and clinical research to determine the viability of market entry for a new use case related to the company’s core technology. The problem definition is relatively “blank sheet of paper”. In order to ensure alignment and make sure we are adding value to the company, our student team is defining objectives and key results (OKRs) and SMART goals. It is satisfying to me to see how these building blocks of corporate process, to which I have been exposed through coursework and Almirall, are already proving their utility and that I can be a driver in their application to the work.