National University of Engineering, Peru
DUNE is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to do frontier physics in the exciting field of neutrinos, a particle we don’t know much about. It’s also a great chance for our country to develop our technology and science. I’m helping represent Peru in this field — playing in the big leagues. My physics experience has prepared me for outside situations, too. Seven days after I got my driver’s license in the US, I had driven to Virginia from Fermilab and was on my way back when a tire blew up right in the highway. I remained calm enough to take control of the situation. I was in the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania. No phone signal. No Google maps. A random guy helped me put on the spare tire, and a tow truck driver took my car 60 miles to the nearest city. I didn’t know where I was. It was crazy. I got a new tire. I went to a hotel. I was so stressed, the next morning at 2 a.m. I left, heading to Fermilab. In physics, sometimes the detector just breaks. At first we don’t know what’s going on, but we need to keep calm and take action very quickly. That car breakdown was exactly the same.