Strength, value of Purdue-Colombia partnership felt in the career-changed lives of over 500 participants as program marks 10 years

Strength, value of Purdue-Colombia partnership felt in the career-changed lives of over 500 participants as program marks 10 years

Ana Maria Ulloa Gómez was a dentistry student in 2017 when she came to Purdue University’s campus as part of the Undergraduate Research Experience Purdue-Colombia program to work alongside materials engineering professor Lia Stanciu and focus on biomaterials research.

During her Purdue semester-long stint six years ago, she studied a Type 1 collagen coating for enhancing the integration of an iron-based alloy to the bone. She understood the iron-based alloy’s promise as a suitable material to manufacture new implants. Little did Ulloa Gómez realize her life would be forever changed by her time at Purdue as a college senior.

Once she completed her undergraduate studies and involvement in the program, known as UREP-C, Ulloa Gómez moved from dentistry to materials engineering. And her Boilermaker experience had another chapter: Ulloa Gomez decided to pursue a PhD here. She completed her doctoral dream in in just four years, in December 2022, in researching the development of electrochemical and colorimetric sensing platforms for agriculture and health care applications.

Now a senior research specialist for Dow Chemical Co., Ulloa Gómez is part of a select collection of over 500 UREP-C program participants from the South American country of Colombia who are making a major impact, many in their home country and others throughout the U.S. and Europe.

“My time at Purdue was incredibly rewarding,” says Gomez, who is based at Dow Chemical’s major research facility in Midland, Michigan. “The UREP-C program was life-changing. I am so grateful for the opportunities the program gave me. 

UREP-C, a research-based mobility program launched a decade ago, is fostering educational and cultural enrichment for undergraduates from underserved communities throughout Colombia, according to Juan Diego Velásquez, Purdue’s assistant director of global partnerships and director of Latin American Programs and the Colombia-Purdue Partnership.

Through this innovative global engagement program, Colombian students study for six months at Purdue’s main campus, partnering with faculty from both countries to conduct research. Each visiting student also is matched with a current Colombian Purdue graduate student, a local host family and Purdue-enrolled native speakers.

“A lot of doors to the potential opportunities for these students at Purdue are opened because of other types of collaborations faculty might have with Colombia or universities there,” Velásquez says. “The students also have become the best ambassadors within Colombia and the program that I can have.”

Related Story

• Purdue-Colombia program expands; similar efforts planned for Mexico, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru

‘I will always remember my time at Purdue’

Since February, Alison Sofia Mesa Canizales has had the opportunity to work alongside renown Purdue researcher Rakesh Agrawal, the Winthrop E. Stone Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering. Agrawal served as her advisor, and PhD student Shabhansu Agarwal was her mentor. 

She presented her senior project during the program’s final symposium on July 19. Titled “Solution-Processed BaZrS3 With Low-Cost Molecular Precursors: A Game-Changer for Tandem Solar Cell Advancements on a Budget,” the project examined the benefits of using low-cost materials, specifically chalcogenide perovskite, for producing more affordable solar cells. 

Sparked by her Purdue experience, she plans to pursue an advanced degree in chemical engineering.  And becoming a Boilermaker graduate student remains high on her list of choices before Mesa Canizales goes into industry.

“I will always remember my time at Purdue,” she says. “I wanted to focus on renewable energy. And through my experience and the tremendous opportunity to work with Professor Agrawal and PhD student Shabhansu Agarwal, I gained access to new tools, cutting-edge laboratories and new knowledge, preparing me for the next steps in my career.”

Additional Information

• Undergraduate Research Experience Purdue-Colombia
• Boon for Colombian students, Purdue and society
• Purdue Office of Global Partnerships

Sociology student blazing trail for Liberal Arts majors

Daniel Felipe Pinzón Quintero had a life-changing experience — and knew he also was blazing a trail for future students in the program. Of the 40 Colombian students in the spring 2023 cohort, he was one of only two students from the College of Liberal Arts.

Advised by Purdue sociology professor Jeremy Reynolds, Pinzón Quintero examined the work schedules for gig workers for a final presentation titled, “Work Schedule Fit and Platform: Dependence among Gig Workers on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk Platform.” The core of the research, Reynolds says, is being submitted to journals for potential publication, with Pinzón Quintero as a co-author.

“I’ve grown a lot. And because of my Purdue experience in this program, the person I am today is completely different than who I was six months ago,” says Pinzón Quintero, who now plans to pursue a doctorate in sociology and become a professor and researcher.

Reynolds was excited to partner with UREP-C and advise Pinzón Quintero. For Reynolds, UREP-C was a calling. He characterizes his own study abroad experience in Austria as an important and formative time in his college years that helped define his career choice in academia. “Daniel has been super-ambitious and active. He’s done a first-rate job of making the most of his time here at Purdue,” says Reynolds, who joined Purdue’s faculty in 2016.

More and more faculty embracing program

Luisa María Sandoval Calle came to Purdue as a chemistry student through UREP-C in the fall 2022 semester, joining the research group led by Michael Reppert, an assistant professor of physical and theoretical chemistry, as an intern to work on understanding structure-function relationships in native photosynthetic proteins. 

She used the opportunity to broaden her horizons by working in experimental biochemistry and in the production of recombinant proteins to study photosynthesis in model systems. She focused on her passionate area of interest — computational chemistry and generating forcefields for chlorophyll and its derivatives.

“This rewarding experience has allowed me to interact and exchange ideas with the leading and specialized global research community,” Sandoval Calle says. “It strengthened my persistence in pursuing a career in academia and aided in improving my teamwork, time management, communication and self-reflection skills. I’m grateful to Purdue for the experience of immersing myself fully in the academic research environment, giving me the tools to begin my journey to achieve my goals: to be a strong woman, a remarkable professor and an outstanding scientist.”

An academic, research – and cultural – experience

The Purdue experience for aspiring civil engineer Néstor Fabián Rodríguez Buitrago was just as impactful — both for the rewarding academic opportunities of his time here through UREP-C in 2017, and also the time he spent outside the classroom and laboratory.

While at Purdue, Rodríguez Buitrago’s research focused on the 3D printing of cementitious materials with controlled architectures, working with renowned researchers Jan Olek, the James H. and Carol H. Cure Professor in Civil Engineering, and Pablo Zavattieri, the Jerry M. and Lynda T. Engelhardt Professor in Civil Engineering.

“The idea of being a civil engineer came to me after finding out how much I loved mechanics and chemistry, and after each one of my schoolteachers told me I was going to be an engineer,” Rodríguez Buitrago says.

Rodríguez Buitrago also benefited from another unique aspect of the UREP-C. West Lafayette couple Joe and Opal Wilkerson served as his weekend host in connection with UREP-C and Purdue’s International Friendship Program, exposing the Colombian undergraduate to Midwestern culture, entertainment and the popular sites while traveling throughout Indiana. 

“It was an incredibly pleasant experience,” says Joe Wilkerson, members of Covenant Church in West Lafayette who with his wife has hosted four Colombian students during their time at Purdue. “We would take them around Indiana and give them a taste of life in our state. We highly recommend this experience, especially for couples who have elementary and high school students at home. It’s a wonderful way to learn about other cultures in our world that these students wouldn’t otherwise.”

In working with Ulloa Gómez as an undergraduate before she decided to pursue her doctorate at Purdue, Stanciu says Ulloa Gómez was a quick study, showing a passion­­­ to learn and understand concepts and laboratory techniques in areas she was not initially familiar with. That, Stanciu adds, bodes well for the type of students Purdue has grown accustomed to attracting through programs such as UREP-C.

“Ana’s best qualities are her intellectual curiosity, ability to be flexible and not shy away from new topics, intelligence, perseverance, attention to detail and dedication to the team,” Stanciu says. “She is also an excellent team member, who always helps everyone else on her team with no hesitation.”

Ulloa Gómez has advice for the next class of Colombian students arriving this month through UREP-C. 

“Once you’re part of the program, plan not for your next six months at Purdue but for your next five years — whether you’re thinking about pursuing graduate school or going into industry,” Gómez says. “As long as you have that mentality, anything’s possible. It can be a game-changer for your career.”

Writer: Phillip Fiorini, pfiorini@purdue.edu, 765-430-6189