I was born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela. I left the country to attend the undergraduate Computer Engineering program at UCSD. During my time as an undergrad, I co-founded a student org named Divergent Engineering (DivE). From my time there I met many fantastic engineering students who I worked with in several projects that I am very proud of, inclding 'ECE 5: Making, Breaking, and Hacking Stuff', Project in a Box (PiB), and 'ECE 140: The Art of Product Engineering'
After a gap year in which I worked mainly on ECE 140, I joined the UCSD graduate program as a Master of Science student in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at UCSD. I was a Computer Engineering student for a year and a quarter where I went through most of its grad curriculum, from VLSI to Parallel Computer Architecture. Instead of graduating in one more quarter, I chose to switch my focus to Machine Learning and Data Science, which caused me to stay a few more quarters. There I focused on a more theoretical/mathematical understanding of ML, in topics such as Statistical Learning and Image Processing.
I enjoy computer engineering. My interests lie everywhere within that field: though I've always been intrested in low-level aspects such as computer architecture and embedded systems, I have recently taken a liking to Web Development. And as my graduate education indicates, Machine Learning is my most recent dabble in a new field. Currently, I am leaning towards learning about Quantum Computing, a concept that will inevitably shift a lot of paradigms in our world. One aspect that is consistent in my passion for this field is my preference for all things Open Source. I like both free as in freedom and free as in beer, so why not. Combine those insterest with my minimalist tendencies and I end up with Arch+i3 as my main workstation (I use Arch btw).
One of my biggest hobbies is reading. From Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, to Spinoza’s Ethics, to Calvin and Hobbes (the comic strip, not the philosophers. Though I shoudl check out the philosophers as well); authors hailing from every single continent (except Antartica, cuz, you know...) I enjoy reading all sorts of topics, especially those which I am not knowledgeable in. As my guilty pleasure, I love fantasy books. Tolkien might be my favorite author of all time, my university offers a course on Middle Earth and I took (well, audited) that class.... twice. My other favorite author is George RR Martin. I loved ASOIAF, and I can't wait for TWoW. I believe he will be remembered as the best fantasy author of our generation. Though Fantasy is my favorite, there are other parts of genre fiction I enjoy. Dan Simmons' sci-fi epic, The Hyperion Cantos, is one of my favorite stories.
Find me on Goodreads to see my taste! (Under the 'About' tab).
Finally, I like health and fitness quite a bit. There is such a wide variety of activities within this field, so I am always busy trying something new.
Last Updated: March 2020