Jaime Lagunez

Jaime Lagunez is a scientist and activist. He proposed bases therapies for cancer and AIDS maintaining investigations in bioinformatics. During the promotion of the research of the field of Complex Systems, he became scientific advisor and director of [http://www.crionica.org Instituto de Criónica] , an organization dedicated to cryopreservation. He has directed the creation of computer programs for modeling intramolecular communication and microarray analysis. His PhD thesis with Edward Trifonov of the Weizmann Institute,presented a universal triplet periodicity of coding sequences pointing to extremely conserved ribosomal RNA sites.

Lagunez has spoken in favor of protecting archeological, historical and environmental heritage in Mexico, especially in Cuernavaca and Teotihuacan. Since 2002, along with professors Neil Wollman and anti-apartheid activist Dennis Brutus, he has contributed to the international coalition Make TIAA-CREF Ethical [http://www.maketiaa-crefethical.org] dedicated to lobbying shareholders of 400 billion dollar fund into divesting from corporations shown to have damaged society, among them Costco, Walmart, Altria and Coca-Cola. He is a strong supporter of the call to declaring June 6 as World Ethics Day by the Amazonian community of Tawabtinsuyu.

In 2004 the organization Frente Civico, with which he collaborates received the National Mendez Arceo Human Rights Award for having protected civil liberties and the environment against repressive governments. He has made constant declarations against privatizations in Mexico such as that of the telephone company, PEMEX, and the National University. In the same year he was violently dismissed from his work at the National University but won the appeal to work again in 2007. In 2005, 60 archaeological sites in Cuernavaca, Morelos were published as heritage sites by the state of Morelos as a result of the work of the Frente Civico. He also participated in the process of establishing internal and surrounding forests as natural reserves and has recommended to declare the Valley of Cuauhnahuac as a UNESCO world heritage area. He has since received support of the Senate with a "Punto de Acuerdo" in favor of the same area approved in August of 2008 [http://www.senado.gob.mx/gace.php?sesion=2008/08/13/1&documento=60.] .Scientific organizations such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) the American Chemical Society, and the commission on human rights of the American Physics Society (CIPS), have expressed support, both for his actions and scientific projects. He is currently a visiting scientist at the Centro Internacional de Ciencias, A.C. in Mexico. He is included by Marquis in Who's Who in Science and Engineering and Who's Who in the World.