I hold a bachelor’s degree in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology from the University of Colorado Boulder (2016). From 2016-2017 I worked as a researcher in the laboratory of Brent Palmer at the University of Colorado Denver, Anschutz Medical Campus. Here I Investigated the role of gut microbiota in the activation of an immune response to HIV, and how dysbiosis in the microbiome contributes to disease susceptibility in vulnerable populations. In 2018 I moved to Minneapolis and joined the laboratory of Ryan Hunter, where I studied cross-feeding relationships within the cystic fibrosis lung microbiome. In 2020, I joined the Microbiology, Immunology, and Cancer Biology (MICaB) graduate program at the University of Minnesota and joined the laboratory of Ran Blekhman in spring of 2021.
The gut microbiome has a remarkable and varied influence on host health among the spectrum of human populations. Intestinal microbiomes of western populations are compositionally different and less diverse than their non-western counterparts and are associated with immune misregulation, driving gastrointestinal diseases such as ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease, and colorectal cancer. However, because microbiome studies mostly identify correlations, it is not known if variation in the microbiome impacts host physiology, and through what mechanisms. In partnership with the laboratory of Francesca Luca, our group recently developed a novel in vitro co-culture system utilizing a human epithelial colonocyte cell line and live gut microbiomes and are also developing an ex vivo system based on intestinal organoids. Leveraging stool samples collected in collaboration with the Global Microbiome Conservancy, I plan to investigate the effect of interpopulation microbiome variation on host gene expression in order to understand its impact on host health. It is my aim to frontier the effort to provide a causal explanation to the established associations among human microbiomes and industrialization.
