Bio
Dr. Erika Tatiana Camacho has a long and successful career in and outside of academia as a mathematical biologist, researcher, educator, mentor and advocate for racial and gender equity. Camacho is the inaugural holder of the Manuel P. and María Antonietta Berriozábal Endowed Chair and professor in The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA)’s mathematics and neuroscience, developmental and regenerative biology departments. Camacho was a Fulbright Research Scholar at the Institut de la Vision-Sorbonne Université in Paris 2022-2023. From 2019-2022 Camacho had three impressive years of work at the National Science Foundation (NSF) as Program Director co-Lead of the Hispanic- Serving Institutions (HSI) Program and Program Director of the ADVANCE and the Racial Equity in STEM Education Programs.
Camacho’s research includes using mathematical modeling to understand physiological processes, in particular mathematical ophthalmology. Her work is reported in more than 30 peer-reviewed publications. Currently her work is expanding from dynamic mathematical and computational multi-scale models of cellular and molecular processes to include experimental work that complements current retina degeneration research. Her work to-date includes mathematical models of key metabolic pathways in cones (particularly aerobic glycolysis) and glutathione redox system, photoreceptors and RPE interactions, and treatments to slow photoreceptor degeneration. Her research investigates both the healthy and diseased retinas at the cellular and molecular levels and disruptions in the photoreceptors’ metabolic processes resulting from nutrient deprivation, increased oxidative stress, and oxygen imbalance. Camacho published the first set of mechanistic models addressing photoreceptor degeneration and established a new framework to help mitigate blindness. In her earliest retina publication, her work predicted the existence of a necessary mechanism experimentally discovered a year later - the rod-derived cone viability factor (RdCVF) and proposed equations describing the dynamics of the rod and cone outer segments and the RPE cells.
Camacho’s leadership, research, scholarship, and mentoring have won her numerous national and regional recognitions including the 2019 American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS Mentor Award), the 2014 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring (PAESMEM) award from the White House, a 2022 NSF Director’s Award for Superior Accomplishment, the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) 2023 M. Gweneth Humphreys award, the 2020 Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) Presidential Award, the 2020 AWM Louise Hay Award for Mathematics Education, the 2018 AAHHE Outstanding Latino/a Faculty in Higher Education Research/Teaching (Research Institutions) Award, the 2017 Great Minds in STEM Education Award, the 2012 SACNAS Distinguished Mentoring Award, and one of 12 Emerging Scholars by Diverse: Issues in Higher Education in 2010, among many other national awards and honors. She was a 2013-2014 MLK Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Most recently, Camacho was named a Fellow of the Association of Women in Mathematics (AWM) and a Fellow of the American Mathematical Society (AMS) in January 2024.