Sofia E. Arevalo earned her bachelor’s degree (2016) and her master’s degree (2018) in mechanical engineering from University of California Berkeley, where she currently is a July 2022 PhD candidate and a member of the Medical Polymer Group Research Lab. Her doctoral work spans engineering education, nanomechanics, and failure analysis. She has pioneered the use of nanoindentation along with micro- and macro-scale tests to establish structure-property relationships in polymers used in orthopedic applications, namely total joint replacement design. She has offered extensive mentoring to high school students, high school science teachers, and undergraduates. In 2020, she completed the Graduate Remote Instruction Innovation Fellows Program, which focused on transitioning from in-person to remote teaching. Arevalo is the recipient of an NSF graduate fellowship, the 2021 Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor award, and has participated in the ME Rising Stars and NexProf programs. She has been active in the Society for Hispanic Engineers and serves on the Committee for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. Future research will focus on nanomechanical techniques as a diagnostic tool to investigate the degeneration and progression of diseases, such as osteoarthritis and cancer. As a professor, she plans to create a diverse research team that moves the medical engineering research field forward.

Research Interests

Biomechanics