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C&EN's 2024 Trailblazers
Alán Aspuru-Guzik blurs the boundaries between chemistry, AI, and robotics
Varinia Bernales develops safer chemicals while making science more equitable
Sarah Briceño turns Ecuador's natural resources into nanomaterials
Mónica Cala leads the first metabolomics facility in Colombia
Karina Carneiro rebuilds tissue using synthetic DNA
Aline M. Castro writes children's books when she's not capturing carbon
Luis A. Colón has spent decades increasing diversity in the chemical sciences
Rogelio A. Hernández-López reprograms cells to fight cancer
Juan Paulo Hinestroza matches nanotechnology with fashion design
Eusebio Juaristi has spent a career thinking about molecules in 3D
Carlos A. Martinez used nature's catalysts to make Paxlovid a reality
Edna Matta-Camacho fights against educational disparities in rural Colombia
Maria Fernanda Mora looks for life on other planets
Monica Olvera de la Cruz brings chemical simulations into the real world
Pablo Pastén tracks the chemical legacy of Chile's mines
Melissa Ramirez went from first-generation college student to university professor
Martín Salinas coaxes crops to make animal proteins
Anabella Villalobos has redefined how we treat neurological diseases
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Outreach
Melissa Ramirez’s journey from first-generation college student to university professor
Graduate student Ramón Gudiño García talks with this computational and synthetic organic chemist about how being a Latina in science has influenced her career
by Ramón Gudiño García, special to C&EN
September 20, 2024
| A version of this story appeared in
Volume 102, Issue 29
Melissa Ramirez uses a cutting-edge approach that combines computations and experiments to develop catalytic reactions. As she wraps up a postdoctoral position at the California Institute of Technology, she’s gearing up to start her own lab at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities using this approach to perfect computational models to study chemical reactions. Ramón Gudiño García talked with Ramirez about what it’s like to move into the role of a professor as well as the importance of hands-on mentorship.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
Vitals
Melissa Ramirez
▸ Hometown: Pasadena, California
▸ Education: BA, chemistry, University of Pennsylvania, 2016; PhD, organic chemistry, University of California, Los Angeles, 2021
▸ Current position: Postdoc, California Institute of Technology; incoming assistant professor, University of Minnesota Twin Cities
▸ Impactful book: Stacey Abrams’s book Minority Leader: How to Lead from the Outside and Make Real Change motivated me to pursue a career in academia. Through this book, I gave myself permission to dream big and to write my story.
▸ Hobbies: I love to take high-intensity interval (HIIT) training classes and Peloton (I have the bike and rower at home!).
▸ I am: Latina, Chicana
Melissa Ramirez
HOMETOWN: Pasadena, California
EDUCATION: BA, chemistry, University of Pennsylvania, 2016; PhD, organic chemistry, University of California, Los Angeles, 2021
CURRENT POSITION: Postdoc, California Institute of Technology; incoming assistant professor, University of Minnesota Twin Cities
IMPACTFUL BOOK: Stacey Abrams's book Minority Leader: How to Lead from the Outside and Make Real Change motivated me to pursue a career in academia. Through this book, I gave myself permission to dream big and to write my story.
HOBBIES: I love to take high-intensity interval (HIIT) training classes and Peloton (I have the bike and rower at home!).
I AM: Latina, Chicana
Image Credit: Cortesía de Melissa Ramirez
Ramón Gudiño García: Congratulations on your new position! I read on your website that you are a computational and synthetic organic chemist. What does that mean?
Melissa Ramirez: Currently, chemists usually first develop or optimize a reaction in the laboratory and subsequently perform computational modeling to analyze the reaction. But as a synthetic and computational chemist, I use computations and experiments in tandem to develop a variety of chemical transformations.
With the guidance of computations, I can better understand reaction mechanisms and molecular structures. Without computations, that information would be challenging to obtain or unattainable..
RGG: What will your lab at the University of Minnesota investigate?
MR: My group is going to focus on developing new reactions in asymmetric catalysis, main-group catalysis, and transition-metal chemistry. I am looking for ways to apply computations to solving challenges in synthesis.
Bigger picture, I see my group developing computational models for reactivity to predict a reaction product prior to reaction setup. As an example, it would be incredibly helpful for chemists to know whether we can functionalize one particular site of a molecule versus the other before testing the reaction out in the lab.
What really will set my group apart is the training that students will have in both experiments and computations. When I went from undergrad to graduate school, I wanted to both do computations and run experiments, and that was really challenging in terms of time management and being an effective science communicator to two different audiences.
RGG: Are you excited to be a mentor to your new students?
MR: Very excited! I am most excited to learn about my students’ backgrounds and science journeys, to learn about the kinds of questions that they ask.
Another thing I’m excited about doing in my independent career is learning more about how to help international students enter US-based PhD programs and perhaps having a partnership with UAMI [the Autonomous Metropolitan University of Mexico, Iztapalapa] and UNAM [the National Autonomous University of Mexico] to bring chemistry students to Minnesota.
RGG: Also, I see that you have done a lot of outreach and mentorship activities at Caltech, right? What were those like?
Another thing I’m excited about doing in my independent career is learning more about how to help international students enter US-based PhD programs.
MR: Two of the most exciting outreach activities that I participated in at Caltech were, first, returning to my old high school in Pasadena, Marshall Fundamental School, to introduce students to organic chemistry. I organized graduate students and postdocs to visit my high school, where we introduced students to the field, careers in organic chemistry, and what the path from high school to graduate school looks like. We also synthesized nylon with students.
I was able to directly give back to students whose shoes I was once in. Marshall Fundamental serves students from so many racial and ethnic backgrounds. And from a standpoint of socioeconomic status, nearly 75% of them qualified for free or reduced-price lunch last school year.
The second activity was mentoring undergraduate summer research students at Caltech via the Wave program. This program aims to foster diversity by increasing the participation of students historically excluded from science and engineering PhD programs. I served as a mentor to six students in the summer of 2023 and recently mentored a group of five this summer.
RGG: As a Latina in science, how do you think your identity has shaped the way you do research and mentoring?
MR: My identity as a Latina has led me to see my colleagues and mentees beyond the science. The personal qualities that I bring to science—resilience, grit, persistence, and empathy—are shaped by how I was raised as a Latina and by the communities I am a part of.
My identity has also shaped my resourcefulness and optimistic perspective. For example, in a reaction, I may not generate the product I initially wanted but instead formed something unanticipated yet valuable.
RGG: Yes, that resonates with me. I feel like sometimes you have to make the most out of something.
MR: At an early age, I didn’t have the immediate resources; I had to find a way. I had to ask questions, and I had to take advantage of [whatever was available]. I was at a public school where the education was not at a high level, so I had to take advantage of whatever college prep programs I could find.
Vitals
Ramón Gudiño García
▸ Hometown: Mexico City
▸ Education: BSc, pharmaceutical and biological chemistry, National Autonomous University of Mexico, 2021
▸ Current position: PhD candidate, chemistry, Matthew R. Pratt’s laboratory, University of Southern California
▸ Best professional advice i’ve received: My mentor Giuliano Cutolo would always tell me to write down any small change in conditions of a reaction or experiment in a given day. That might explain any unexpected results in the future.
▸ What reminds me of home: All the Mexican food in LA and hearing people speak Spanish pretty much everywhere in LA.
▸ I am: Latino and Mexican
I think, where there’s a will, there’s a way, but tenemos que querer. Tenemos que echarle ganas. You have to couple desire with hard work.
RGG: I know you’re a first-generation university student; so am I. Every one of us has their own story about how we decided to pursue a career in science. What was yours?
MR: My parents were both born in Tijuana, Mexico, and only went up to the second grade. I became interested in science in high school because I participated in the California State Summer School for Mathematics and Science (COSMOS). There, I became really fascinated with how some fish in the ocean light up and how chemistry can be used to explain it.
Then I participated in the Caltech Summer Research Connection (SRC) program the summer after 11th grade. At Caltech, I had two mentors, Ramón Rodríguez, who was a high school teacher in Glendale, and Ann Anderson, a middle school teacher in Pasadena at the time. Both of them helped me study the water quality of the Arroyo Seco, which is a local stream here. That’s when I knew I wanted to do research during college.
RGG: When I was in high school, I fell in love with chemistry as well, and I think that my parents played an important role in my going to college. Did something similar happen in your case?
Ramón Gudiño García
HOMETOWN: Mexico City
EDUCATION: BSc, pharmaceutical and biological chemistry, National Autonomous University of Mexico, 2021
CURRENT POSITION: PhD candidate, chemistry, Matthew R. Pratt's laboratory, University of Southern California
BEST PROFESSIONAL ADVICE I'VE RECEIVED: My mentor Giuliano Cutolo would always tell me to write down any small change in conditions of a reaction or experiment in a given day. That might explain any unexpected results in the future.
WHAT REMINDS ME OF HOME: All the Mexican food in LA and hearing people speak Spanish pretty much everywhere in LA.
I AM: Latino and Mexican
Ramón Gudiño García is developing the next generation of metabolic chemical reporters to selectively study glycosylation and the participating enzymes in the cell. He also enjoys learning new languages, swimming, and dancing salsa.
Image Credit: Jesús Emiliano Vázquez García
MR: My parents were always working, but they always encouraged my curiosity. They wanted me to do better than they had in terms of obtaining an education.
They didn’t want me to do what they did, even though both did jobs that are important. These jobs just don’t provide good financial stability, I would say. My dad was a cook and a dishwasher at a restaurant local to Caltech called Burger Continental for many years. Then he worked at the dining hall at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and then also at the dining hall here at Caltech. My mom was a caregiver to [older adults] for many years.
At a young age I had that sense of “I need to do better, and I want more for myself.” I think that it is actually part of the mindset as the daughter of two immigrants.
RGG: I have one last question. Is there any piece of advice that you would like to share with other young scientists out there?
MR: Stay true to yourself. Only you can decide what you’re capable of. I’m the kind of person who has sticky notes in the kitchen, and I have a sticky note right now that says, “Embrace change, aim high.”
More online
Read this article in Español | Português.
Chemical & Engineering News
ISSN 0009-2347
Copyright © 2024 American Chemical Society
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