Research Areas

My research generally focuses on the development of norms and standards of practice and classification in scientific organizations. I am pursuing this line of research through two projects.
The first is concerned with sampling practices and conventions of classification in human biology from the mid-Twentieth Century into the present. This comparative historical project traces the impact of ‘populationist’ views of human difference on the categorical work of physical anthropologists, epidemiologists and physiologists. This work extends from The International Biological Programme of the 1960’s to The 1000 Genomes Project launched in 2008. The second project explores the adoption and use of CRISPR/Cas technologies in multiple organizational contexts. Through ethnographic research in laboratories housed in distinct organizations and with different research programs, this project seeks to detail the incorporation of genome engineering techniques into scientific work and to explain how, when and under what conditions are standards of practice articulated.

I grew up in Querétaro, in central México, and unfortunately have lived on this half of the border for the larger part of my life now. While at Berkeley, I have thoroughly enjoyed teaching SOC01 Introduction to Sociology, SOC05 Evaluation of Evidence: Methods, and STS100 Topics in Science and Technology Studies. I would happy to meet over coffee/tea/beer to talk about any of the above research interests, tangentially related topics, graduate school, or birdwatching.