Since I was a child, I’ve been highly curious and have always been trying to understand why things happen. I’ve always enjoyed science, particularly biology, and by the end of high school, I knew I wanted to be a scientist. I studied biology at ICESI University in Colombia, and it was an unforgettable time full of knowledge and life lessons. In the final year of my undergraduate studies, I decided which field of biology I wanted to dedicate and expand, and that was evolution. It was a subject that inspired me to pursue further, which is how I discovered Landry Lab during the Mitacs Globalink Research Internship in 2023. A single semester of evolution coursework generated my interest, and throughout my internship, I proceeded to discover more in Christian’s lab. I was able to learn about gene duplication and how it affects fitness. Additionally, despite the language issue I was experiencing at the time, I felt completely at home in Quebec, which has wonderful people. Now, I am pursuing my master’s degree at Christian’s lab; I began in the summer of 2024, and it has been an enjoyable journey.

Another fact, I love cats and my favorite hobby is painting; both are the remedy for my soul. 【≽ܫ≼】

Research Interests

I am doing research on how diploid organisms adapt in response to loss-of-function (LOF) mutations, with a particular focus on the phenomenon of negative dominance. In diploid fungi, mutations can be in both heterozygous and homozygous genotypes and multiple studies have shown that these mutations, whether beneficial or deleterious, are often recessive compared to the wild-type allele. LOF in many genes cause antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in haploid fungi but these mutations are thought not to confer resistance in diploid fungi. However, we found that, as is the case for some human diseases, some LOF mutations causing AMR exhibit degrees of dominance. We hypothesize that this occurs when the mutant allele ‘poisons’ the wild-type allele disrupting its normal function and protein assembly.