Being born in Brazil allowed me to grow up immersed and overwhelmed by nature. From an early age, my parents encouraged close contact with nature, and I recall visiting the ecological park within preserved Cerrado areas, where I first became fascinated by biodiversity. During my undergraduate studies in Biotechnology at the Federal University of São Carlos, I developed a strong interest in molecular genetics and bioinformatics. This interest led me to work with Osteoglossiform fishes at the Laboratory of Evolutionary Cytogenetics, resulting in my first publications on population genetics and phylogeography of Osteoglossiforms. During my master's, I focused on Hoplias malabaricus, a model species for studying multiple sex chromosome systems, combining population genetic and phylogenetic approaches. In my PhD, I returned to Osteoglossidae, now applying a genomic approach, with particular interest in the evolution of sensory systems in South American species inhabiting contrasting environments, such as blackwater and whitewater rivers in the Amazon River basin. These species provide a natural model to investigate how the environment could have shaped the visual system, coloration, and other adaptive traits. I joined the FISH EVO group for a brief time as a visiting PhD student in 2023, and following this great experience, I have returned for a one-year stay. My current research aims to investigate the evolution of vision and coloration in Osteoglossum species, testing whether these traits played an important role in their adaptive and evolutionary history.