The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation has announced that Markita del Carpio Landry, a faculty scientist in the Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioengineering (MBIB) Division, is among their 100th class of Guggenheim Fellows. Chosen through a rigorous application and peer review process, del Carpio Landry is one of 198 fellows recognized based on prior career achievement and exceptional promise. 

“We believe that these creative thinkers can take on the challenges we all face today and guide our society towards a better and more hopeful future,” said Edward Hirsch, award-winning poet and President of the Guggenheim Foundation. 

In addition to her appointment with Berkeley Lab, del Carpio Landry is an associate professor in the departments of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and of Neuroscience at the University of California, Berkeley. She is the principal investigator of a multidisciplinary research group that melds physics, chemistry, and life sciences. Her work involves studying the behavior of chemicals within and between cells and building nanoscale tools to address a wide range of challenges—from measuring chemical exchanges in the brain to improving plant resiliency through bioengineering. 

As a Bolivian and Native American woman in science, del Carpio Landry is motivated to bring both her perspective and lived experience to her work. With this fellowship, she intends to combine her professional experience in plant biotechnology and interest in brain chemistry to explore the medicinal properties of plants in the high-altitude Bolivian Altiplano. In this part of the world, the most extensive high plateau on Earth aside from Tibet, there are over 50,000 medicinal plants, most of which remain scientifically unexplored. 

By combining her research interests with her understanding of the Bolivian environment and culture, del Carpio Landry’s Guggenheim project will be the first to explore the content of Andean medicinal plants that have been used for centuries by local populations to treat central nervous system disorders, but have yet to be rigorously and scientifically studied. 

“I’m still in awe to have received the Guggenheim fellowship,” del Carpio Landry said. “Aside from the financial support provided by the award, which will support highly explorative research into the therapeutic potential of Bolivian medicinal plants, this recognition inspires taking big and bold approaches in my research program moving forward.”