After completing high school in El Salvador (2007), I moved to Santiago de Compostela in Spain to study my bachelor in chemistry. In 2012 I finished my bachelor’s thesis under the supervision of Arturo Lopez Quintela on the synthesis and characterization of silver clusters of low atomicity. During that year I started a master degree on Nanoscience and Nanotechnology at the Barcelona University. Following that, I performed my PhD thesis under the supervision of Conxita Solans and Carlos Rodriguez-Abreu, at the Institute for Advanced Chemistry of Catalonia in Barcelona. The main question guiding my PhD thesis was: How can we take advantage of aqueous molecular self-assembly processes to produce novel and functional materials. My doctoral dissertation consisted on a systematic study of the self-assembly and phase behavior in water of cationic dyes (that form fiber-like aggregates) and hexosome-forming diglycerol based surfactants, and their application as templates in the synthesis of functional nanomaterials. In addition to my PhD I have been involved in R & D projects funded by multinational companies. These projects consisted in studying the phase behavior of essential oils/surfactant/water systems with the aim to produce nano-emulsions by low energy emulsification methods. Additionally, during my PhD thesis I had the opportunity to visit three different laboratories in Europe and Asia (Lund University, INL and NIMS). I completed my PhD in 2017 with honors and joined the Voet’s group as a post-doctoral researcher.