Maria Magdalena Ortiz-Juza graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in Biology with a concentration in Physiology. Following graduation, Maria worked as a post-baccalaureate at the National Institute on Drug Abuse under the supervision of Dr. Khaled Moussawi. There, she validated and developed a fentanyl vapor self-administration model in mice to study opioid addiction. Currently, Maria is an NSF-GRFP Fellow in the lab of Dr. Jose Rodriguez-Romaguera in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Here she uses multi-photon calcium imaging approaches to understand circuitry related to arousal states and motivated behavior. Maria is grateful for all her excellent mentors that helped her career and hopes to have just as large of an impact to others!