Benita Altamirano, senior

From: Albuquerque, New Mexico

Exploring: Physics

Thinking outside the cubicle: In high school, I had my sights set on engineering as a career. But I decided I didn’t want to go to a straight engineering program and spend the rest of my life in a cubicle. Lewis & Clark offered so many more opportunities to show me the world.

Spiders and snakes: On the first day of my semester in Australia, my professor made a comment about the venomous snakes in the area. I was immediately intrigued, so I contacted two leading researchers in Sydney who were doing work in the medical applications of venom. I ended up spending a large part of the semester researching venomous spiders and sea creatures and the potential pharmaceutical uses for neurotoxins.

Volcanic explorations: My interest in volcanoes started in a similar way. A side trip to New Zealand on the way back from Australia led to a trek up a volcano. That sparked a new fascination that I explored further at Lewis & Clark with a geologist on the faculty, Elizabeth Safran. Through a connection of hers, I was able to blend my advanced lab project with a study being conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey on nearby Mount St. Helens.

Seeing infrared: Right now I’m taking photography for the first time, and that’s led me down a whole new path of thinking. I’m developing a proposal for a physics project to take infrared photographs of different animals to see if I can capture their body temperatures on film.

Exploring the possibilities: Since coming to Lewis & Clark, I’ve fallen in love with physics. I’m thinking about a future in nuclear medicine, but that could change. I’ve learned I have a lot of options.

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