University of Illinois at Chicago
As a part of my graduate research at UIC, I am joining a long-standing collaboration between Dr. Rachel Poretsky and Post-doctoral researcher Dr. Melissa Pierce at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center (NWFSC) to learn about the role of microbial communities in fish growth and survival with the goal of evaluating and improving Sablefish aquaculture techniques (check out some of their previous results here).
Dr. Pierce and I were at the NWFSC in March 2020 to conduct the most recent experiments, where we hope to use a combination of 16S rRNA sequencing and metabolomics analyses to further understand the link between microbial communities and larval survival rates. Results from these experiments are forthcoming. |
College of Charleston
Prior to my arrival at UIC, I completed my Master's degree at the College of Charleston conducting research with the National Institutes of Standards and Technology (NIST), where I was advised by Dr. Rusty Day and Dr. Tracey Schock.
My thesis was entitled "Characterization of growth anomalies in finger coral (Porites compressa) using metabolomics and trace elemental analysis". This research included three primary components: trace element analysis of diseased and healthy coral skeleton, development and optimization of sample preparation methods of coral samples for NMR-based metabolomics analysis, and metabolomics analysis of diseased and healthy coral tissues. Results from the methods development (here), trace element (here) and metabolomics (here, full-text access) analyses have been published separately. |
Presenting at the Metabolomics Association of North America (MANA) 1st annual meeting at Georgia Tech in November 2019.
Presenting at the 14th Annual international conference of the Metabolomics Society held in Seattle, WA in 2018
Presenting at the 2017 annual meeting of the Carolinas Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (cSETAC) in Charleston, SC where I won the 2nd place Distinguished Dr. Stephen J. Klaine Platform Presentation award.