Camila Vasquez Vidal

Camila Vasquez Vidal

Biography

Camila Vásquez Vidal is a rising sophomore majoring in Biology at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras. Born in San Salvador, El Salvador, she moved to Puerto Rico in 2018 due to the country’s instability. Her resilience, creativity, and curiosity fostered an early interest in art, nature, and science, while her family instilled in her a deep sense that education is both a privilege and a responsibility. A pre-college neuroscience program at MIT introduced her to scientific research, where she explored non-invasive approaches to neurodegenerative diseases. In high school, she conducted a case study on circular migration and its effects on the management of type 2 diabetes, linking cultural and environmental factors to therapeutic outcomes. As a freshman, she contributed to a geoscience project applying historical methods to estimate the magnitude of El Salvador’s 1918 earthquake by comparing it to a similar event in Puerto Rico in 1917. Later that year, she participated in MSRP General at MIT, where she conducted research in the Hammond Lab at the Koch Institute, working on optimizing layered lipid nanoparticle production for targeted mRNA delivery in cancer models under the mentorship of graduate student Alexander Stoneman. Currently, she conducts research in Dr. Imilce Rodríguez-Fernández’s lab at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras, where she studies host–microbiome interactions using Drosophila models, investigating how genetic background influences gut microbiome composition and stability. Camila’s research interests lie at the intersection of microbiology, diet-induced physiologies, and therapeutic delivery, with a focus on addressing public health disparities. In her free time, she enjoys creating art, working out, and caring for animals.