I am an evolutionary geneticist broadly interested in the genetics of complex traits and the evolution of organismal allocation patterns. The core life processes for every organism, such as surviving in the environment, finding food and mates, and reproducing, require the organism to allocate some its limited resources to these functions. Different selective pressures have produced the diversity of strategies that we see within and among species in how and when to allocate resources to different structures and functions. In my research, I use both computational and empirical techniques to try to understand both how different allocation strategies evolve and the underlying genetic architecture of this highly complex trait. Go to the Research page to find out more about what I do.
Currently, I am a postdoctoral scholar in the Long Lab at the University of California, Irvine. I received my Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of California, Riverside, working in Daphne Fairbairn’s and Derek Roff’s labs. I began my science training as an undergraduate at Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa.