Profile

Senior research scientist with 25 years of experience in international, multicultural projects from concept to delivery. Expert in experimental design, data analysis, and development of innovative research tools. Secured €0.5M in funding, authored two patents, and published 20 peer-reviewed papers.

Professional Experience

Models of Cancer Therapies Laboratory, Vall d’ Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO), Barcelona, Spain.

• Senior Researcher. 2025 – present.

• Research Associate. 2020 – 2024.

• Senior Postdoctoral Researcher. 2016 – 2019.

Growth Factors Laboratory, VHIO.

• Postdoctoral Researcher. 2010 – 2015.

Institute for Experimental Genetics, School of Medical Sciences, National University of Rosario (UNR), Argentina.

• Ph.D. candidate. 2005 – 2010

• Undergraduate student. 2001 – 2005

Experience by Functional Areas

Project management

Project design, development, execution plan, and writing of reports.

Design and writing of two grant proposals for three-year projects, including all aspects (financial, resource planning, execution), funded by Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities.

Involved in the writing and/or development of other projects.

Coordinator of technicians involved in the projects.

International collaboration. Published papers in collaboration with research groups from Europe, the Americas and Asia.

Research & Experimental Leadership (Development of research/analysis resources)

• Hypothesis-driven planning, organisation, agile and dynamic coordination, execution and support of in vivo and in vitro experiment.

• Mouse colony management sustaining the execution of my experimental plan.

• Development of bioinformatic pipelines and data visualisation strategies.

• Generation of cancer cell lines: resistant to standard-of-care treatments, derived from spontaneous metastases in mice, and from patient-derived xenografts.

• Generation of mouse models of lymphoma.

Data Analysis:

• Bioinformatic analysis in R, interpretation and visualisation of data.

• Statistical, biomedical, and bioinformatic analysis and interpretation of data.

Scientific Output & Dissemination

• Authored 20 scientific papers: ORCID link.

• Publications metrics (Web of Science): H-Index: 10, sum of times cited: 679.

• Edition of books and special issues:

  • 2026 The MYC Gene – Methods and Protocols, 3rd edition. Soucek, Zacarías-Fluck, eds. Springer Nature. In preparation.

  • 2024 MYC as a disease target beyond cancer. Whitfield, Zacarias-Fluck, et al.

• Presentations in scientific meetings: 35 in Argentina, Spain, USA, Germany, Poland.

• Holder of two patents in biomedicine:

  • 2023 Combination Therapy with BRAF Inhibitors for the Treatment of Cancer.

  • 2023 Combination Therapy with MEK Inhibitors for the Treatment of Cancer.

Mentorship: three: a medicine student, a Ph.D. student and a M.Sc. student.

Teaching, five courses, for undergraduate and Ph.D. students.

Education

Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences

2006 – 2010 School of Medical Sciences, UNR. Thesis: “Regulation of Galectin-1 expression in lymphoma and its relationship with tumour growth and immune response”.

Degree in Biotechnology

1996 – 2005 School of Pharmaceutical and Biochemical Sciences, UNR. Thesis: “Dynamics and modulation of Galectin-1 expression in a rat lymphoma model treated with a low dose of Cyclophosphamide”.

Languages: Spanish (native speaker), English C1, German B1, Catalan A2

Other studies: Music Composition (three years of pre-University studies and three years of higher education at the UNR), intermittently from 1996 to 2008.

Honours and awards

• 2026 Grant funding as Co-PI. “MYC inhibition as a strategy to disarm BRAFi resistance”.

• 2015 – 2017 Postdoctoral Scholarship “Juan de la Cierva”, Spain.

• 2013 Successfully past the EPSO/CAST/S/5/2013 Researcher (FG IV) selection process.

• 2008 – 2010 CONICET (Argentina). Type II predoctoral scholarship.

• 2006 – 2008 ANPCyT (Argentina). Predoctoral scholarship.

• 2005 – 2006 SALES Foundation (Argentina). Undergraduate scholarship.

Skills and interests

• Strong background in translational oncology research, Data Visualisation.

• Excellent communication and presentation skills in English and Spanish.

• Robust writing skills.

• Working in culturally diverse research groups to define objectives, methodologies and draw conclusions. Receptive and good listener.

• Encouraging critical thinking and discussion.

• IT skills: Intermediate knowledge of R programming, Fiji/ImageJ, Inkscape. Advanced knowledge of Microsoft Office Suite and GraphPad Prism.

• Interests: Genealogy (20+ experience as a researcher), Paleogenetics.

References

• Dr. Gabriel Rabinovich, Caixa Research Institute, Barcelona, Spain, and IBYME, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

• Dr. Laura Soucek, VHIO, Barcelona, Spain.

• Dr. O. Graciela Scharovsky, Rosario, Argentina.

• Dr. Joaquín Arribas, VHIO, Barcelona, Spain.