B.S. University of New Hampshire (Microbiology) Minor in Nutrition
Awards: Fund for Excellence in Graduate Recruitment (2020)
Bio: My work encompasses themes in microbial ecology in both marine and agricultural systems. As an undergraduate I oversaw field collection and processing of environmental samples to monitor the population dynamics of various Vibrio sp. in the Great Bay River of New Hampshire.
Upon graduation I challenged myself to apply microbial ecology to soil and plant health at Indigo Agriculture, a startup ag-tech company in Boston. My focus as researcher was weighted towards the design of high throughput screening assays including evaluation of nutrient use efficiency (Nitrogen fixation, phosphate & potassium solubility, protease activity), siderophore production, osmotic stress tolerance, and antibiosis activity. In my graduate research I look forward to applying this skillset to investigate the microbial functional diversity in agricultural soils and to better understand what drives community assembly, in particular, around aquatic-terrestrial dispersal.
In my graduate research, I plan to study the microbial ecology of soils and plants to improve the efficacy of microbial inoculants in sustainable agriculture. Specifically, I will be working on a project with the following research objectives: 1) How does the loss of certain ecological types impact the function of microbial assemblages? 2) Can selecting for ecological traits of interest enhance the development and reliable application of microbial inoculants for agriculture? 3) What is the cost to bacteria of expanding their habitat breadth along different environmental axes? Research Interests:
Applied microbial ecology
Plant/soil/microbe interactions
Microbial assembly and dispersal/movement
Marine & terrestrial agricultural systems
Presentations:
Northeastern Microbiologists Physiology Ecology and Toxicology (NEMPET) Conference, 2019. Microbial Discovery Pipeline at Indigo Agriculture. New York
Lecture at Northeastern University, 2019. Application of Plant-microbe Interactions in Biotechnology. Boston, MA.
Lecture at Indigo Agriculture, 2019. Journey of a Microbe. Boston, MA.