School of Social and Political Science

Background

I am trained as an infectious disease scientist and a medical anthropologist. I am studying towards a PhD in the area of Science and Technology Studies (STS). I am broadly curious about human and microbial sociality. I am interested in understanding how infections, biomedicine, science and societies intersect, and in finding ways to achieve dialogue, listening and thinking the complex medical and social problems of the present across disciplines.

Doctoral research project

"Optimizing antibiotics: Antibiotic stewardship, medical work and resistant microbes in public hospitals in democratic Spain"

In this project I investigate antibiotic stewardship interventions in Spanish public hospitals, which are known as Programas de Optimización de Antimicrobianos (PROAs). Antibiotic stewardship is one of the main biomedical interventions being implemented to mitigate the problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) across the world. This study aims to investigate PROAs both historically and ethnographically. Based on two years of fieldwork between 2021 and 2023, "Optimizing antibiotics" aims to shed light on how a medical intervention to tackle the issue of AMR in the clinical context is integrated into a public healthcare system and historically situated work relationships and knowledge production.

As an ethnographer, I am interested in understanding how clinicians, clinical microbiologists, hospital pharmacists and other hospital professionals coordinate their work to imagine, design and implement PROAs by using technologies, materials and work relationships available to them in their specific workplaces. The main theoretical questions I will address in this project concern how the objective of optimization is achieved in Spanish antibiotic stewardship, how materials, infrastructures and labour are coordinated to that end, and how 'resistant' microbes emerge as knowledgable and governable in and through PROAs. In my research, I experiment with mixing ethnographic and historical methods, using historical sources as an ethnographic device in my fieldwork encounters and interviews with professionals.

My PhD project is supervised in collaboration between the subject area of Science, Technology and Innovation Studies (STIS) and the Edinburgh Centre for Medical Anthropology (EdCMA), in the School of Social and Political Science at the University of Edinburgh: Lukas Engelmann (STIS), Miguel García-Sancho (STIS) and Ian Harper (EdCMA, Social Anthropology).

Qualifications

• 2019 - (expected summer 2025). PhD in Science and Technology Studies - University of Edinburgh (part-time)
• 2017. MSc in Medical Anthropology and Global Health - Universitat Rovira i Virgili de Tarragona and Universitat de Barcelona
• 2014. BSc (Honours) in Biomedical Sciences (Infectious Disease) - University of Edinburgh

Academic work at Edinburgh

As part of my professional training as an Alice Brown scholarship fellow (2019-2025), I take part in different academic projects within the School of Social and Political Science at the University. Some of the positions I have held include:

• Research associate, ERC The Epidemy project (2023-present)
• Managing editor, Medicine Anthropology Theory (MAT) journal. MAT is the flagship open-access journal in medical anthropology, edited by scholars at the Edinburgh Centre for Medical Anthropology (EdCMA) and hosted by Edinburgh Diamond, the open access hosting service at the Edinburgh University Library (2020-2024)
• Research assistant, 'Domesticating Covid-19 Epidemiological Models' project, Centre for Biomedicine, Self and Society (CBSS) (2020)
• Archival researcher associate, student-led decolonial project UncoverED (2019-2020)

Teaching at Edinburgh

I have over five years of experience as a tutor and marker in multiple courses at the School of Social and Political Sciences, including: History of Science (STIS, 2023-24), History of Western Medicine (STIS, 2020, 2021, 2023) Investigating Science in Society (STIS, 2021-22), Contagion (Social Anthropology, 2020-21) and Science, Nature and Environment (STIS, 2019-20). I have also delivered guest lectures on infectious diseases, AMR and the colonial history of science at the University in several courses delivered by staff at STIS. I have also been a project supervisor (projects on AMR as a future challenge of medicine) for the Social and Ethical Aspects of Medicine (SEAM) component of the 2nd year of the medical degree at the Medical School (2022-24).

Other affiliations at the University

• Graduate student member, Centre for Biomedicine, Self and Society, Usher Institute (Medical School), University of Edinburgh.
• Member of the student group Students of Medical Anthropology (SoMA) at the Edinburgh Centre for Medical Anthropology (EdCMA), University of Edinburgh.

Awards and Funding

• 2023. Erasmus+ Staff Mobility grant for teaching and training, University of Edinburgh, Scotland.
• 2022. Conference Travel Award (4S/ESOCITE, Mexico), Society for the Social Study of Science, US.
• 2022. Saltire Early Career Scholar Fellowship, Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE), Scotland.
• 2019-2025. Alice Brown Doctoral Scholarship, School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh, Scotland.
• 2019. La-Caixa INPhINIT Retaining Doctoral Fellowship (2019-2022), Spain. (Not accepted.)
• 2017. Postgraduate Student Excellence Award, School of Humanities, Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona), Spain.
• 2015. Postgraduate Professional Training Fellowship (Academic publishing), University Rovira i Virgili (2015-2016), Spain.

Publications

Research Articles

Moreno Lozano, C. 2024. 'The imperative of teamwork in antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) interventions: Insights from an ethnography with practitioners in Spain.' Forthcoming.

Engelmann, L., Montgomery, C., Sturdy, S. and Moreno Lozano, C. 2022. 'Domesticating models: How models became performative in the UK COVID-19 pandemic.' Social Studies of Science https://doi.org/10.1177/0306312722112616

Moreno Lozano, C. 2022. '¿Cuántos son demasiados? Reflexiones alrededor del uso y consumo de antibióticos. Disparidades. Revista de Antropologia 71 (1): 007 https://dra.revistas.csic.es/index.php/dra/article/view/884

Moreno Lozano, C & Flores Martos, JA. 2019. The Challenges of Storytelling Today. Interview with Paul Stoller. AIBR, Revista de Antropología Iberoamericana 14(2): 191-203. doi.org/10.11156/aibr.140202 (Spanish translation here).

Academic commentaries and blogs

2021. ‘Patchwork Ethnography, A Conversation with Cristina Moreno Lozano’, www.patchworkethnography.com, 28/05/2021.

2020. Biography of Edinburgh alumna and chemical engineer Azar Besharat-Moayeri, UncoverED website, 15/12/2020.

2020. Commentary: A problem in the making: visualising AMR and antibiotic use in Spain. AMIS Hub (blog), 01/05/2020.

2020. Seeing COVID-19, or a Visual Journey Through the Epidemic in Three Acts. Somatosphere (blog), 05/04/2020.

Book reviews

2022. ‘María Jesús Santesmases. The Circulation of Penicillin in Spain: Health, Wealth and Authority.’ Journal of the History of Science and Allied Sciences 77(1): 123-25 https://doi.org/10.1093/jhmas/jrab047.

2019. ‘Biology In Culture’ Review: Sara Kenney and John Watkiss, 2017. Surgeon X, Vol.1-6: The Path of Most Resistance. Journal of the History of Biology 55(1) doi.org/10.1007/s10739-019-9557-z

2018. 'Greene, JA, Condrau, F, and Siegel Watkins, E (Eds.) 2016. Therapeutic Revolutions. Pharmaceuticals and Social Change in the Twentieth Century. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.' Medicine Anthropology Theory 5(4): 125-128. doi.org/10.17157/mat.5.4.618

Newspapers and public engagement (Spanish)

2022. ‘Una sociedad saturada de ciencia’, EspacioS de Educación Superior (blog), 2 April 2022. 

2020. Cuarentenas, mascarillas o higiene: coronavirus, siempre en sociedad. El Salto Diario newspaper, 05/03/2020.

2019. Cómics y Resistencia a los antibióticos: Surgeon X. SEM@FORO, Revista de la Sociedad Española de Microbiología, 67.

2019. Hasta la vista, antibiótico! El Salto Diario newspaper, 10/08/2019.