International Community Feature: Sergio Hernández

For our first International Community Feature of the year, we’re delighted to spotlight Sergio Hernández, a second year PhD candidate in the Biomedical Sciences Program at the Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine.   

Born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia, Sergio immigrated to the US at the age of seven with his family. They then went on to settle in Ontario, Canada a few years later. As a first-generation college student, he pursued his undergraduate studies at Brock University (where he’ll be honored later this month with their 2025 Distinguished Alumni Award). As he was beginning to gravitate to the health sciences field, a particularly engaging medical microbiology course opened up the world of infectious disease research to him. During his graduate studies at Brock, he started working with Dr. Ana Sanchez and traveled with her on three occasions to Honduras to conduct field research on neglected tropical diseases. Once he began considering PhD programs in the US, he was first recruited by the New York State Department of Health, and then later went on to work in a lab focusing on Lyme disease research at Mass General Hospital in Boston. He officially joined the Tufts community when that lab shifted to Tufts Medical School.  

Sergio’s current research focuses on the immunopathogenesis of Lyme disease. He is trying to determine how individual immune responses vary in patients and what is it about the microbe specifically that causes that variety. He’s also exploring cases where multiple infections have occurred and examining whether that might lead to longer-term protection / immunity. Beyond Tufts, he envisions doing a post-doctoral fellowship, hopefully somewhere in Massachusetts given the prevalence of Lyme here, and maybe one day leading his own academic lab. 

Adjusting to life in the states has mostly been a smooth process with Canada right next door and being easy to travel to for a taste of home. But trips to Colombia have been far less frequent over the years – high on the list of what Sergio misses most about his childhood home is the food, such as ajiaco (a hearty soup) and churrasco (grilled steak). Some of the ways he remains connected to his heritage these days is through music (like Yeison Jimenez, J Balvin, and Grupo Niche), celebrating holiday traditions with his family (for instance reciting novena prayers at Christmas), keeping up with Colombian current events, and seeking out the Latino community here. And he is eager to point out how much he’s felt at-home since coming to the area. Boston feels like it’s right in the sweet spot of offering big city energy without the really overwhelming chaos other large metropolises tend to have. It provides a wealth of opportunities from exploring the rich local history and multi-cultural communities to visiting museums (the Isabella Stewart Gardner and Museum of Science are personal favorites), cheering on the many local sports teams, and enjoying the diverse restaurant scene. In contrast, North Grafton offers a tranquil, natural environment as a nice counterbalance – about an hour west of the city, this quiet rural town is surrounded by farmland and there are lots of ways to explore the outdoors. 

Sergio sums up his experience at Tufts into one word: enriching. Pursuing his studies in the US has given him a highly unique vantage point that he wouldn’t have had otherwise. It has allowed him to grow personally and professionally and meet so many people, including international community members (his own PI, Yi-Pin Lin is from Taiwan). And his piece of advice to those feeling anxious about studying in another country is to embrace the adversity! In his experience, being in a place where you don’t have a built-in support network forces you to seek one out and this will ultimately help you grow as a person. You can learn a lot about your sense of self and personal values through the process of sharing your story with others. And he feels it’s important to remember that the magic really happens when you’re outside of your comfort zone – it’s the salt of life!   

-by Julia Keith 

(photo courtesy of Sergio Hernández)