I am a Puerto Rican professor, scientist, strategist, consultant, and institutional leader whose career brings together theoretical soft matter, computational science, higher education transformation, innovation ecosystem building, and adaptive organizational change. I serve as Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez (UPRM), where I have built a research and leadership profile defined by analytical rigor, systems thinking, and a sustained commitment to expanding capacity in science, education, and innovation. Across my work, I move between the world of fundamental research and the practical demands of institutions and organizations that must adapt, improve, and deliver results under uncertainty.

At the center of my academic identity is a deep engagement with soft matter physics and fluid mechanics at the colloidal scale. My research is theoretical and computational, drawing on transport phenomena, statistical mechanics, low-Reynolds-number hydrodynamics, Brownian and Langevin dynamics, microrheology, and particle-based simulation to understand how complex fluids and colloidal systems move, assemble, respond to fields, and generate emergent structure. My work has addressed topics such as magnetic Janus colloids, colloidal self-assembly, active matter, anisotropic suspensions, shifted-dipole interactions, reconfigurable complex fluids, and field-responsive materials. Across these problems, my scientific signature is clear: I seek mechanism, predictive understanding, and mathematically grounded explanations for how microscopic interactions produce macroscopic behavior.

My research program is shaped by the belief that theory is not separate from application, but foundational to it. By combining physical intuition, modeling, and computation, I study how particulate systems can be directed, tuned, and designed for broader technological relevance. This perspective has connected my work to questions in advanced materials, biomedical microdevices, soft robotics, environmental applications, and AI-enabled materials discovery. I approach soft matter not as a narrow specialty, but as a rich multiscale domain in which scientific insight can drive innovation.

I earned my bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from UPRM and my master’s and doctoral degrees in Chemical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology. My academic formation gave me a strong grounding in transport, colloidal dynamics, and particle-scale physics, and that foundation has remained visible throughout my career. At UPRM, I progressed through the faculty ranks from instructor to professor while also contributing to interdisciplinary graduate education through affiliations in physics, bioengineering, and computing-related programs. I have developed courses in soft materials, colloids and interfaces, and research training because I believe advanced scientific education should cultivate not only technical competence but also intellectual independence and curiosity.

As a scholar, I have built a strong record of publication, mentoring, and externally funded research. My work has appeared in respected journals across soft matter, colloid science, and fluid mechanics, and I have led or contributed to major projects supported by agencies such as the National Science Foundation and NASA. These efforts include research awards, infrastructure development, undergraduate research training, and interdisciplinary initiatives that connect scientific discovery with broader institutional capacity. I do not see myself only as a producer of scholarship, but also as a builder of programs, collaborations, and research environments in which others can thrive.

Mentoring is a central part of my professional identity. I have invested heavily in helping students become confident researchers, careful thinkers, and effective communicators. My work in undergraduate research training, course design, and REU leadership reflects a commitment to widening entry points into research culture and supporting talent development across levels. I view scientific training as more than technical apprenticeship. For me, it is a process of helping students develop judgment, discipline, clarity, and the confidence to contribute meaningfully to knowledge creation. That same commitment extends beyond the university through outreach, teacher engagement, and public-facing STEM education efforts designed to make science more accessible and more connected to everyday curiosity.

In addition to my scholarly work, I have played significant leadership roles in higher education administration. Within the University of Puerto Rico system, I have served in senior positions including Special Assistant to the Chancellor for Research, Innovation, and Creative Endeavors at UPRM, Interim Vice President, and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Research. These roles placed me at the center of academic planning, research strategy, university modernization, institutional assessment, innovation policy, and system-wide transformation. They gave me direct exposure to the operational, political, and structural realities of public higher education, especially in Puerto Rico, and strengthened my commitment to building more agile, accountable, and future-oriented institutions.

My administrative work reflects a practical reform orientation. I have been involved in efforts related to digitization, process redesign, academic portfolio development, online education, research competitiveness, grant strategy, and organizational streamlining. I am especially interested in how institutions can move from rigid, reactive patterns toward systems that are more adaptive, better aligned, and more capable of sustained improvement. That concern with institutional design has become one of the defining threads of my broader work.

Beyond academia, I am the founder and CEO of Acerola Strategies, a consulting practice focused on complexity management, systems innovation, adaptive strategy, and organizational transformation. Through this work, I help institutions and organizations navigate uncertainty, diagnose structural challenges, align stakeholders, and build practical pathways for change. My consulting approach is informed by complexity science, adaptive leadership, and data-driven planning, but it is also grounded in real-world experience. I understand that durable change rarely comes from static plans alone. It comes from disciplined experimentation, iterative learning, honest diagnosis, and the ability to create conditions in which people and systems can perform better together.

My work with Acerola Strategies reflects a broader pattern in my career: I consistently translate scientific habits of mind into institutional and organizational settings. In research, I study interacting systems with feedback, emergence, and multiscale behavior. In leadership and consulting, I work with organizations that exhibit those same properties in human form. This continuity is one of the distinctive features of my profile. I am not simply someone with multiple careers running in parallel. I bring a single intellectual orientation to different domains, using systems thinking, structured analysis, and adaptive execution to address complex problems across science, education, and strategy.

I am also active in the broader research and innovation ecosystem of Puerto Rico. My work has included contributions to entrepreneurship initiatives, ecosystem mapping, partnership development, and boards and advisory roles tied to science, technology, and institutional advancement. I have been involved in efforts to connect universities, public institutions, nonprofit organizations, and innovation actors in ways that strengthen long-term capability and opportunity. In this sense, my work is not limited to my laboratory, campus, or firm. It is part of a larger commitment to helping shape the scientific, educational, and innovation future of Puerto Rico.

A defining aspect of my profile is my ability to operate across levels of scale. I study particle interactions and emergent material behavior at the microscopic level. I mentor individuals and lead research groups at the human scale. I work on universities and organizations at the institutional scale. I contribute to ecosystem building and strategic development at the regional scale. Few professionals move credibly across all of these levels. I do so by relying on a consistent set of capacities: analytical depth, multiscale reasoning, clarity of communication, collaborative problem solving, and a bias toward implementation.

I am also deeply bilingual in the fullest sense of the term. I write and think in both English and Spanish, and I move comfortably between technical scientific discourse, strategic analysis, public commentary, and institutional narrative. This ability allows me to speak across communities that often remain separated from one another: researchers, students, administrators, policymakers, innovators, and civic audiences. I am not only a specialist producing knowledge within a field. I am also a translator of complexity across domains, helping different groups understand problems, possibilities, and paths forward.

Personally and professionally, I am driven by the challenge of building capability. In science, that means stronger theory, better models, deeper insight, and more predictive understanding. In education, it means developing students into independent and thoughtful researchers. In institutions, it means creating structures, processes, and cultures that can sustain excellence and adapt under pressure. In consulting, it means helping organizations move from aspiration to action through disciplined strategy and measurable progress. Across all of these settings, my work is marked by intellectual seriousness, practical ambition, and a long-view commitment to meaningful impact.

For me, success is not defined narrowly by titles, visibility, or output alone. In my field, success means producing respected research that advances understanding, training people who go on to contribute independently, securing resources that expand institutional capacity, and creating systems that remain stronger after my direct involvement ends. It means not only generating ideas, but also building the conditions under which ideas can matter. By that standard, my career is best understood as a sustained effort to make complex systems, scientific, educational, and organizational, more capable, more adaptive, and more generative.

In full, I am a scientist of complex matter, a builder of people and programs, a reform-minded academic leader, and a strategist for institutions operating in dynamic environments. My work brings together rigor and imagination, theory and execution, scholarship and transformation. Whether I am studying colloidal self-assembly, mentoring emerging researchers, leading institutional change, or advising organizations through complexity, I am guided by the same core purpose: to expand knowledge, strengthen capacity, and help build a more intelligent, resilient, and innovative future.

Academic Leadership | Economic Development Impact