“I was a non-STEM major when I moved to the US 10 years ago, and I never thought I could be good at science. But my parents were like, ‘You're in the new world, why don't you try new stuff?’ I don't know why, but I decided to study chemistry—and it was amazing. … Somehow I got into UCSD as a transfer student, and I joked to my friend that I would go to Caltech for grad school. But then I actually got in. “I was kind of nervous because I didn't have a deep background in STEM, but when I first cam