The opportunity to reflect on having had the experience to do a Ph.D. at an institution of Caltech’s caliber brought with it a deep reflection of how unlikely my twenties were. Ten years ago, when my adventure into science began, I was just a naive kid with a romantic view of what being a scientist meant and with no real hands-on experience to back up any of such idealized views. On paper, I was not supposed to be here. Not only I graduated from an institution that nobody ever heard about, but I was explicitly told by my professors at this institution that I was “just a kid from Mexico” and that I was not going to amount to much. My big dreams of making it out of my situation to study abroad and dedicate my life to understanding the natural world were almost shattered beyond repair. During this absolute low point of my life, a series of fortunate events got me here. This journey over the last decade has only been possible because I have had the immense fortune of being surrounded by incredible people. I want to take this opportunity to recall the story of how I got into Caltech, hopefully thanking every person that has helped me along the way to reach this moment.
As I just mentioned, before coming to Caltech for the first time, my scientific credentials were next to null. Circumstances I did not choose had me stuck in an unfavorable situation where almost every professor at my college thought of me as “a stubborn and hard-headed guy, too ambitious for his good.” Multiple attempts to bring my spirit down were starting to be successful, as I seriously considered dropping out of college to try my luck with something else. This is where the first big name in this story appeared. Adrian Jinich, back then a staff scientist at a nearby research center and a soon-to-be graduate student at Harvard, came to my middle-of-nowhere school with a simple idea: he was going to inspire the next generation of Mexican scientists by working with students on a hands-on project during the weekends. Those Saturday meetings with Adrian were going to change my life in unexpected ways.
Adrian happened to have a textbook that has guided my thinking and my love for science for the last decade and, with a little bit of more luck, will continue to do so for decades to come. This textbook, Physical Biology of the Cell, by Rob Phillips, Jane Kondev, Julie Theriot, and Hernan Garcia instantly became a pseudo-religious bible to me. Since I was not learning anything useful in school, I dedicated countless hours to understanding the contents of this textbook. And, on a lonely night of April 2011, when I was feeling more desperate than ever after having gotten into a heated discussion with one of my professors, I sent an innocent email to the first author of the book with zero expectations of ever receiving a reply. The email said something like this:
Dear Professor Phillips PhD,
My name is Manuel Razo, I’m a Mexican student in the National Polytechnic Institute in Mexico… The reason for writing you this letter is because I’ve been studying your book… I found fascinating every single page in the book, to the point that I’m looking forward to work one day in a topic related with biophysics…I know that you are a very busy and important Scientist, but it would mean a lot to me if you could give me any advice of what to do in order to achieve my goals.
Little I knew that this innocent email would set my career path for the rest of my life. A few weeks after sending this email, Mr. Phillips took the time to reply to the message, giving me inspiring words about how he sees life and the meaning of being a scientist. One conversation led to another, and sooner than I realized, Rob challenged me to come up with a project to work on during a summer internship. Talks with Adrian and a lot of reading led me to an idea. I wrote down this proposal and sent it to Rob. At this time, I did not know what to expect. I had never been involved in any research project or knew what it took to become a Caltech summer student. But, to my fortune, Rob liked my naive idea and invited me to spend not only the summer but an entire year working in his lab. So there I was, a nobody with no credentials being given the opportunity of my life. I will have more to say about Mr. Phillips later on.
That year, my horizons expanded like never before. I passed from only interacting with people with my cultural background that spoke my language to be in an incredibly diverse and stimulating environment that encouraged bold ideas. At that time, I met two people that became mentors and friends. James Boedicker, a postdoc in the lab at the time, now a tenured faculty member at USC, went beyond what he needed to do when he taught me how to do experiments. He taught me how to use a micropipette, grow bacteria, and organize experimental work. But his mentoring and advice went beyond lab work. He and his wife Amy invited me for lunch or dinner on several occasions since they knew I was on an extremely tight budget. James became my second mentor and my primary guide when it came time to apply to grad school. His kindness, patience, and caring showed me that there are multiple facets to every society. Although the news wanted me to believe that every person in this country automatically hated me because of my nationality, James’ friendship shattered all dumb preconceptions I could have had.
If there is something I did not expect to come across in a place like Caltech, that would be Ernie’s Mexican food truck’s enormous popularity. It was during the classic Thursday visits to Ernie’s truck that I got to interact with Justin Bois. At the time, Justin was doing his second postdoc at UCLA. He would come once a week during our group meeting to have the chance to hang out with other physical biologists. Rob decided to recruit Justin and me as honorary TAs for his famous Bi1x class. Every Sunday for the next few months, I helped Justin develop a new module for the class involving fluorescent microscopy on fly embryos. These interactions turned into a friendship. Ever since, Justin and his wife Ramit have treated me and my family unbelievably nicely. After Rob, Justin has been the scientist that has influenced my thinking the most. His classes, sharp mind, computational skills, unbelievably ethical behavior, and his will to share his knowledge set me on the right track from the beginning of my Ph.D., when Justin started a position as a teaching faculty for the Biology division.
As the reader can infer from the context of these acknowledgments, a year at Caltech was not enough. As soon as I could, I came back to Caltech to begin my Ph.D. working again with Rob. My twenties came and went by faster than I thought. Nevertheless, I had the immense fortune to share the lab with three of my great friends and co-authors for many of those years. Nathan Belliveau, Muir Morrison, and Griffin Chure became my lab family. They helped me think through problems and worked with me on numerous successful (and unsuccessful) projects, as we all grew as scientists under Rob’s tutelage. It is not an exaggeration to say that their friendship and support have been a fundamental part of why my Ph.D. experience has been the best time of my life. I would not do justice to Griffin’s influence on my thinking if I did not give a special shout-out to him. For the past seven years, Griffin and I talked almost every single day. We fed off each other’s ideas and together traveled the world. From Korea to New Zealand to Sweden, Griffin became my closest collaborator and someone that every time he has something to say, I am ready to take notes on whatever comes out of his creative and rigorous mind.
Within the Phillips lab, I always felt the environment encouraged collaborations and casual science conversations, for which I will be forever thankful. Rob Brewster, now a professor at U. Mass., taught me several lab tricks that I still use up to this day. Heun Jin Lee, the microscopy master, was an incredible resource and mentor that allowed my research to run smoothly. Without his work and input, it would have been incredibly hard for my projects to take off. I am also thankful to members of the Phillips lab with whom I shared projects, ideas, lunches, and visits to Red Door cafe over the years. People like Suzy Beeler, Stephanie Barnes, Soichi Hirokawa, Niko McCarty, Tom Roeschinger, and Scott Saunders made my Caltech experience much better.
I am enormously thankful to Dianne Newman. I met Dianne for the first time when I was a visiting undergrad at Caltech. I vividly remember having finished giving my MicroMorning talk when Dianne approached me. She congratulated me and told me that I should come back to Caltech since she thought I had what it took to be part of this institution. When I came back to Caltech as a Ph.D. student, I worked in her lab for ten weeks as part of a rotation where I learned about a completely different way to tackling biological problems from what I was used to. Later on, Dianne helped my sister to visit the Caltech daycare and learned from them. She also made my mom unbelievably happy when, in perfect Spanish, she told my mom that I was a great student and that she was very proud of me. Her support and kindness are things I do not take for granted, and I am enormously thankful for them.
I am also thankful to Ginger and Kim Caldwell. Thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Caldwell’s kindness, I was awarded a one–year fellowship that covered my stipend. But they did not only give away the money and forgot about it. They took the time to meet with me and learn about my research projects. This experience reinforced my vision of the kindness that this country’s society can have for a person like myself, pursuing the American dream.
Of course, not everything in my life for the last few years has been strictly about my Ph.D. project and my work at the lab. I owe a significant component of the enormous happiness I experienced since coming to Caltech to my friends outside of work. In particular, I want to give a shout-out to my best friends Stephanie Threatt and Porfirio Quintero. Stephanie and I share a love for hip-hop and good food. We went to concerts, amusement parks, and restaurants, and she has always been there when I needed emotional support. Porfirio and I not only share a nationality, but we shared an apartment for five years. Living with my best friend and having deep conversations and many other adventures out in the wild made all those years an authentic delight to experience. To both of you, thank you really for making my off-the-lab time in Pasadena such an amazing experience. Let’s keep the HOI tradition alive for many, many years to come.
I would also like to give a shout-out to my friend Andres Ortiz. Andres and I have shared long conversations about the meaning of life, physics, math, and everything in between. His powerful intellect and will to always chat about deep stuff make Andres a delightful person to call your friend. More recently, my friend David Larios joined my inner circle and became a really close friend. David and I share a love for learning, talking about science, and, more recently, doing outreach via a podcast where we share ideas from different books that we read. We also share an openness to be vulnerable with each other. The list of friends goes on and on and it would take forever to thank them all. But I would like to give a special mention to my good friends Ellen Yan, Scott Saunders, Enrique Amaya, Alejandro Granados, Jorge Castillo, Emmanuel Flores, Teddy, Adam Gomez, Paola. My friends became my family outside of my home, so I never felt alone during this journey.
And how could I feel alone when so many people that I love were always there for me? Even when I felt like I was feeling homesick (or actually sick or injured), the Osegueda family was there for me. Kathy, Carlos, Patricio, Nico, and Matias adopted me as an extra nephew/cousin, reminding me that family doesn’t necessarily need a direct genetic relationship. I treasure every lunch and every dinner as some of the happiest and most delightful times during all these years.
Shockingly enough, with all the good luck that has gotten me to this point, there is a lot more for which to be thankful. Because of Rob, my professional relationships have not been limited to Caltech only. I spent a total of six months at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) as a teaching assistant for the Physiology and the Physical Biology of the Cell courses. There, I had the fortune to interact with Wallace Marshall, Jane Kondev, Hernan Garcia, Greg Huber, Julie Theriot, and Madhav Mani, all of which have been supportive and inspiring throughout these years. At MBL, I also met my good friends Cat Triandafillou and Christina Hueschen, who I’ll be joining up north for the coming stage of my career.
After this long list, I would like to dedicate specific words to Rob:
Dear Mr. Phillips, Ph.D.,
It is tough to write this section and not shed tears of happiness. I do not have words to express my feelings, but I will try to do my best. Working and sharing so many moments with you has been by far the most significant honor of my entire life. To me, it is clear that the only reason I am writing a Ph.D. thesis for arguably the best research institute in the world is because of you. When I sent that innocent email, I never imagined the incredible person that would await at the receiving end. Not only you took time out of your insanely busy schedule to talk with a stranger with no credentials whatsoever, but you allowed me to prove myself capable of pursuing my scientific dreams. Even when I almost stopped believing in myself, you believed in me. And, after a decade of having sent this email, I stand proud of what we have accomplished together. This thesis reflects everything I have learned from you as I pave my path to become who I want to be.
On multiple occasions, you have told me that you don’t have a recipe for a happy and fulfilling life. But the way you operate and interact with other people makes me want to shape my professional and personal life after yours. I have learned from you that science is not only our job but, if one wants it, it can be a complete lifestyle. Hike after hike, trip after trip, calculation after calculation, I have witnessed your boundless love for the natural world and the constant everyday effort that it takes to get closer to unveiling its mysteries. It is hard to imagine myself one day knowing a fraction of what you know about science, but I will for sure try to keep up with your learning pace, working as hard as I can every single day.
Although I have technically been your employee for the last decade, our relationship has been much deeper than that. Sometimes I have to pinch myself to make sure that this is not a dream. I am actually hanging out with my hero, and he is actually welcoming me in to his family. Everything you have done for me, and now for Daniela, means the world to me. Welcoming us to the most sacred family celebration over Thanksgiving has been a privilege I never expected to live. I cannot thank you, Amy, Molly, Casey, and the rest of your beautiful family, for making us feel part of the festivity and of the extended family. I have even shared some incredibly stimulating and inspiring conversations with Bob Phillips, who literally reshaped my life priorities with his wisdom and kindness.
I know that you despise honors, prizes, and people praising you. But I would not do justice to my feelings if I could not express my deep love and admiration for you. The way you see the world has shaped my vision and understanding of what it means to be alive. Your love for numbers and their explanatory power is an incredible tool I try to apply to science and mundane activities. Your passion for teaching and your unorthodox methodology has shown me that even a random kid from Mexico can get the most complex concepts if one works hard enough and puts the time into it. Each and every lesson you have given me over the last decade will continue to shape my thinking for the rest of my life.
But this is not a farewell. I might be “getting fired” for the n-th time, this time for real. But that does not mean that our scientific adventures have to be over. I hope that we both share the mutual feeling that this is just the beginning. There are many more things to discover, many more books to write (plural for you, obviously), and many more courses to teach together. Thank you for being part of my life, and more importantly, thank you for letting me be a part of yours.
A mi familia:
Papá, Mamá, Hermanini. Es increíble pensar que esta aventura comenzó hace una década. ¿Cuándo íbamos a imaginar que un simple correo que le envié a Rob cambiaría mi vida de manera tan drástica? Pero no toda la fortuna que la vida me ha dado en estos años es obra del azar. Las oportunidades en la vida vienen para las personas que están preparadas para tomarlas. Y no puedo pensar en una mejor preparación que el haber crecido en un hogar como el nuestro.
No es exageración cuando digo que no hay día que reconozca el enorme privilegio que siempre he tenido. A mi hermana y a mi nunca nos faltó nada y siempre nos sobró amor. Cada característica en mi persona de la que me siento orgulloso es el resultado de los valores que ustedes me inculcaron. Mi fortaleza para levantarme todos los días a estudiar se deriva de esas mañanas de estudio a las cinco a.m. donde me mostraron cómo ser disciplinado. Mi compasión hacia mi prójimo son las enseñanzas que los abuelos nos dejaron. El hecho de que sepa hablar inglés es la consecuencia de los sacrificios que ambos hicieron para darnos la mejor educación disponible. Y, aunque los individuos en esa escuela siempre quisieron desahogar sus frustraciones familiares en mí, siempre tuve a mi hermana para defenderme y a mi madre para decirme cómo es que podía sobrellevar esos, pensando en la frase “yo puedo, yo quiero, es muy fácil, y lo voy a lograr.”
Esta tesis es clara evidencia de que esa lección de vida encapsulada en la célebre frase de mi madre siempre fue cierta. Sí pude, sí quise, y definitivamente, sí lo logré. Pero, este logro no solo es mío. Después de todo, soy el reflejo de la persona que criaron. Este logro es de la familia Razo–Mejía entera, incluídos mis abuelos, mi tía Chio, mi tía Marilú y mi tío Pepe que siempre ha estado ahí para apoyarme cuando más lo he necesitado. Desde el día que partí de la casa, sabía que tenía lo que se necesitaba para buscar mi felicidad. Todos los miembros de mi familia me dieron las herramientas para construir el camino en busca de mis sueños. Ese camino continua, y las valiosas lecciones que me dieron a través de los años guiarán el resto de mi vida.
Termino una etapa maravillosa de mi vida. Entré al doctorado como un puberto sin ninguna experiencia de haber vivido fuera de casa, y salgo de esta experiencia como un hombre, con un proyecto de vida por delante. No me queda más que agradecerles por siempre haber estado ahí para mi. Gracias por ser mis papás. Gracias por ser mi hermana. Ustedes, junto con Daniela, hacen que valga la pena vivir cada momento.
A Dani:
Los últimos dos años y medio de mi doctorado son muy probablemente la mejor etapa de mi vida (pandemia incluída). La perfecta correlación entre tu llegada a mi vida y esta enorme felicidad no son coincidencia. Bien supo mi madre que yo estaba enamorado, antes de que siquiera le contara sobre tu existencia. Respiraba un aire diferente, exudaba alegría pura, y trataba a mis seres queridos con mayor atención y compasión. Todo porque, desde el sur de este continente, había arrivado la persona que me permitiría por primera vez experimentar lo que es el verdadero amor de pareja.
El camino hasta este punto, en el que ambos nos hemos comprometido a compartir nuestras vidas de aquí en adelante, ha estado lleno tanto de enormes satisfacciones como de momentos difíciles. Sin embargo, como todo lo bueno que vale la pena en esta vida, nuestro amor ha requerido––y seguirá requiriendo––de arduo y constante trabajo. De cierta manera, el hecho de que nuestro amor no sea un producto terminado, sino un ente en constante construcción, me llena de emoción por nuestra vida juntos. Después de todo, ¿qué sería de mis más grandes momentos de alegría si no tuviera con quién compartir ese sentimiento? Todo ese fervor simplemente aislado en la privacidad de mi experiencia consciente, sin poder ser expresado hacia otra persona; ¡que enorme desperdicio! De igual manera, ¿qué sería de mis momentos de más profunda tristeza y decepción, si no pudiera aliviar mi sufrimiento al estar contigo? Tú haces que el estar vivo, experimentando esta realidad, sea una dicha constante.
Desde el fondo de mi ser, espero que el patrón de felicidad que hemos vivido durante los últimos dos años, sea una muestra de lo que nos espera por el resto de nuestras vidas. Extrañaré nuestra vida en Pasadena, nuestro taco Thursday, y las noches de ver documentales juntos. Pero la vida debe de continuar. Una nueva etapa de auto–descubrimiento y aprendizaje hará de nuestro amor una estructura aún más sólida y compleja, mientras seguimos compartiendo juntos la dicha de estar vivos. Muchísimas gracias por amarme. Yo te amo, y te amaré todos los días de mi vida.