• Brooke Owens Fellow, Class of 2025

• University of California, Berkeley, Integrative Biology, ‘24

• Host Institution: Varda Space Industries

• Mentor: TBD

• Brookie Mentor: TBD

Pia Mendoza dela Cruz is a science aficionado shooting for the stars. They graduated in Fall 2024 at the University of California, Berkeley, with a degree in Integrative Biology. They are pursuing a vast array of career interests—namely aerospace medicine, space biology, and science communication. With their creative content on life as a multi-passionate STEM student, Pia has garnered thousands of global followers and millions of monthly engagements on social media.

Research allowed Pia to develop a diverse skill set. They studied the secretions of salamanders and other herpetology topics at the UC Berkeley Tarvin Lab. Moreover, they wrote several amphibian species accounts as a contributor for AmphibiaWeb. During the summer of their senior year, they were selected to be the Principal Investigator for a project on astronaut bone mineral density in the L’SPACE NASA Proposal Writing and Evaluation Experience Academy. Pia is currently working on an inter-institutional review regarding women’s health and extreme environments such as outer space. They are also a member of the Aerospace Medicine Student and Resident Association as well as the International Society for Gravitational Physiology.

As a genderfluid and nonbinary queer person, Pia aims to promote the STEM fields to the LGBTQ+ community. They were the President of the UC Berkeley Queer + Allied Pre-STEM Professions Affiliation (also known as the Queer + Allied Pre-Health / Pre-Medical Association). Additionally, they mentored queer undergraduates in STEM as a Queer Cal Pals Buddy.

Beyond STEM, Pia is a fiction author represented by Eloy Bleifuss Prados at Neon Literary. Their poetry can be read in literary journals across the web, and their sci-fi novels are forthcoming. They have written articles for organizations including Cut Fruit Collective and Center for Asian American Media. Pia adores making jewelry, watching rom-coms, and collecting blind boxes.

Pia is over the moon to be part of the Brooke Owens Fellowship Class of 2025. They are honored to be interning at Varda Space Industries this summer.