This episode features Nancy’s interview with Yarimar who studies studies the molecular and neural mechanisms of pain perception in the amygdala.

As a curious young student growing up in Puerto Rico, Dr. Yarimar Carrasquillo had always assumed there were two career paths available to those who had a talent for math and science: engineering or medical school. Then, as a pre-med biology student at the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras, the world of laboratory research burst into her awareness. The idea that at her university, there were real scientists working in big labs with benches, chemicals, and microscopes felt to her like something out of Hollywood, and totally irresistible. “I just wanted to experience a real research lab, like in the movies,” she said. Now, as a Principal Investigator of her own lab at the National Institute of Health, Yarimar is living out her cinematic dreams studying the cellular and molecular mechanisms of pain.