Raquel Castillo Fernandez

I am from Barcelona (Spain). I speak both Catalan and Spanish as native languages, I also studied French at school and high school (actually I never studied English! I learned it ‘in the fly’). I have always had several interests, not only physics. I love writing, for example, I used to collaborate in a ‘creative writing’ blog, posting short tales every month, I don’t do anymore since a couple of years ago due to the lack of time.

I studied physics at Universitat de Barcelona and I collaborated during my last years of the degree with the Nuclear Theory Department of this university. When I finished my degree I joined the experimental particle physics group at IFAE (Institut de Fisica d’Altes Energies) as well in Barcelona, in the Neutrino Group, first as a master student and later as a Ph.D. student. I made my thesis on the T2K experiment (a neutrino oscillation experiment located in Japan).

I traveled several times to Japan for work, however, I didn’t learn Japanese. I made my thesis on neutrino interactions, which still is my main topic of research as a postdoc. Neutrino interactions on nuclei are my main interest and I still find it fascinating. I joined the Fermilab Neutrino Division as a postdoc 2.5 years ago. I work mainly in the MicroBooNE experiment.