Team:Colombia/Members

 Undergraduates  

Daniel Giraldo

Daniel is an undergraduate Chemistry and Chemical Engineering double major senior at Universidad de los Andes. Although he decided to study Chemistry, he has always had an interest in Biology and is always eager to learn about other fields. He is very interested in exploring the molecular mechanisms behind pathogenic agents like bacteria and viruses. Although he knows a lot about systems biology, molecular biology is his true passion, which is why he decided to go back to the lab this year. In his free time he enjoys reading books, going to the gym, playing volleyball and is a huge fan of MOOC open courses.

Paula Siauchó

Paula is an undergraduate student in Physics and Microbiology at Universidad de los Andes. She loves knowledge, she is very curious and she love everything related to science, specially anything related with live and how it can be modeled and understood with Physics, it's amazing!. That's why she like so much iGEM and this year she works in mathematical models. Also the social aspect that the proyect have is important for her and, off course, the experience of being part of this wonderful team.​

Fabián Camilo Clavijo

Camilo is an undergraduate student in Medicine. iGEM team is his first contact with applied science, which has always struck him. He is part of iGEM lab group, which has helped him to learn more about different laboratory techniques and how biological systems work. He is very interested in learning how the synthetic biology can be used to treat diseases. He loves to spend his free time watching television series like Game of Thrones or Cosmos, doing some exercise, and sharing with his friends.

Laura Rodríguez

Laura is an undergraduate student in Chemistry and Microbiology at Universidad de los Andes. She is passionate about science, likes organic chemistry and loves bacteria! She is also curious and a realll hard worker. For her, iGEM has been an opportunity to learn, practice lab skills and making good friends!. She is really excited to meet people involved in science from another countries, this will give her a perspective of science outside her country and will also be a cultural enriching experience.

Eitan Scher

Eitan is an undergraduate Medicine and Biology double major freshman at Universidad de los Andes. He joined iGEM this year because he was amazed by the still untapped potential of synthetic biology. His vision is to integrate the later with Medicine so he can exploit the benefits of both, helping the health system providing easy and accessible methods of disease detection and hormone mass production. Though this is his first experience with molecular biology he is always eager to jump right into the lab and learn his way through.

Valentina Mazzanti

Valentina is an undergraduate student at the Universidad de los Andes. She decided to be part of of this great team because she wants to keep working on investigation for the rest of her life. Besides, she studies medicine and feels passionate about detection and further healing of diseases that affect large populations in her country. This is her first time in iGEM and she's loving it.

Camilo Gómez

Camilo is an undergraduate student in Chemistry and Microbiology at Universidad de los Andes. He loves science and, specially, everything that combines these two areas of knowledge such as biochemistry, communication among bacteria, biocatalysis and molecular biology. He is currently working in Laboratory and Human Practices of Colombia iGEM Team, activity that he sees as a great opportunity to grow and improve as scientist and person; knowing new features and applications of synthetic biology and asking for problems that we can resolve with it.

Santiago Tíjaro

Santiago is an undergrate student of chemistry and microbiology at Los Andes university. This is the first year in which he joined the I gem team of the University although he thinks that synthetic biology is an incredible science field that will change the future of the humanity. He loves science and he want to learn everything about it as much as he can so be part of this team has been an incredible opportunity to improve his knowledge about team and lab work.

Pablo Cárdenas

Pablo is an undergrad student at Universidad de Los Andes and a first-time iGEMmer. He is interested in biology, biotech, and the ethics involved in these areas (as well as all of science) in the context of improving public health and social awareness. He is an enthusiastic supporter of open science, open source, and strange music, and is glad to participate in projects like this year's iGEM.

Carlos Sánchez

Carlos Sánchez studies microbiology and physics at Universidad de los Andes, likes traveling, camping and reading in his free time. Always eager to learn new things about everything.

Roberto Morán

Roberto is a fourth-year physics student at Universidad de los Andes. While studying physics trying to understand the phenomena in nature, he realise that one of the most interesting fields to worry about is the life. That’s why he is also enrolled in the biology undergraduate program. Nowadays is working in try to understand some biology systems from the point of view of entropy and information theory. He likes to play soccer often and listen to good rock & roll.

Graduate Students

Daniela Olivera

Daniela is an graduate student (master degree) in Computational Biology at the Universidad de los Andes. She is interested in bioinformatic and biomedical engineering research. This year Daniela is leading the mathematical model group. She loves to spend her little free time playing with her cat (named Anastasia), working on iGEM with her lucky friends, going to cinema and burning calories in the gym.

Instructors

Juan Manuel Pedraza, Ph. D.

Dr. Pedraza leads the Systems/Synthetic Biology division of the Biophysics Laboratory at Uniandes. His specialty is stochasticity in gene expression, but is getting more and more interested in evolution and the consequences of phenotypic variability.

Silvia Restrepo, Ph. D.

Dr. Restrepo is the leader and main researcher at the [http://lamfu.uniandes.edu.co Mycology and Plant Disease Laboratory] at [http://www.uniandes.edu.co Universidad de los Andes]. Additionally, she is the Dean of the [http://ciencias.uniandes.edu.co/index.php/es/home Faculty of Sciences]. Her main research topic is phytopathology, and her favorite organism is Phytophthora infestans Website: [http://lamfu.uniandes.edu.co/ Lab Page]