First Person is a series of interviews with the first authors of a selection of papers published in Journal of Cell Science, helping early-career researchers promote themselves alongside their papers. Paula Slater is first author on 'XMAP215 promotes microtubule-F-actin interactions to regulate growth cone microtubules during axon guidance in Xenopus laevis', published in JCS. Paula conducted the research described in this article while a postdoc in Laura Anne Lowery's lab at the Department of Biology, Boston College, MA. She is now a postdoc in the lab of Juan Larrain at the Department of Cellular and Molecular Biology, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, investigating neuronal development and regeneration.