What is your role at the Turing?
I am a Research Software Engineer and a member of the Turing’s Research Engineering Group (REG). My colleagues and I work on academic projects across multiple domains, developing high-quality software that can be used by researchers. In my time at the Turing, this has ranged from creating a web application for reasoning about the ethics of machine learning systems to building reusable software libraries for synthetic data generation algorithms.
Tell us about your journey before you joined the Turing…
I graduated as a systems engineer from Peru’s National University of Engineering in 2007 and worked for several years as a software developer, mostly in telecommunications and technology companies.
My first contact with research was during my master’s degree, when I used algorithms inspired by the behaviour of ant colonies to tackle computer vision problems in the health domain. In 2015, I came to London to do a PhD in software engineering at UCL, using mathematical models to study the dynamics of collaboration within software development teams. After a couple of years in industry and a couple more as a postdoctoral researcher, I joined the Turing’s REG in 2023.
What are you currently working on?
In September 2024 I joined CVD-Net, a five-year project to develop ‘digital twins’ to improve the treatment of a life-threatening cardiovascular disease called pulmonary arterial hypertension. These digital twins are computer models of the patients’ hearts and, among other things, we hope they will help clinicians to monitor changes in disease progression and test treatments before prescribing them.
Developing these computer models requires manipulating highly sensitive patient data. In cooperation with research software engineers at partner institutes, we are providing technical solutions for ensuring that this data is accessed, analysed and shared safely, protecting the patients’ privacy.
What motivates your work?
I really enjoy the technical challenges of developing software for research projects that are tackling new problems or developing novel approaches, as there is rarely an out-of-the-box software component that will provide what the project needs. Engineering these solutions to support the advancement of science is really exciting.
What has been your highlight at the Turing so far?
I attended and presented at RSECon in September 2024 – a conference on research software engineering held in Newcastle. After meeting with colleagues from other institutes, I was glad to learn that software engineering is being recognised as an important part of scientific discovery. I also realised that research software engineers constitute a large and diverse professional community, that we face many similar challenges, and that as a group we are working together to overcome them.
When not working, what can you be found doing?
I learned to play the guitar while in high school, so I like to practise once in a while before I forget how to do it. I also have a very large list of retro games loaded in my Steam Deck that I’m going through slowly (now playing Half-Life 2). Furthermore, I am subscribed to more streaming services than I really need, but I do love a cosy binge-watching session with my wife.