About Me

Welcome! I am a PhD Candidate at Michigan State University and have dedicated both my Masters and PhD research to understanding how free-living nematode communities infer ecosystem functioning.

Current Broad Interests

Nematode community analyses to indicate shifts in soil food web function 
Regenerative agriculture practices
Microcosm experiments to address ecosystem mechanisms 

Current Work

  • Understanding how nematode communities shift over temporal periods under varying land-use 
  • Effects of climatic disturbance on soil food web function
  • Variation of nematode species function on nitrogen cycling
  • Investigating nematode- microbial interactions

Skillsets
Laboratory Skillset
  • Free-living nematode extraction
  • Nematode identification to genus 
  • Culturing nematode species for downstream experiments
  • Experimental design and administration of greenhouse experiments
  • 16S and ITS DNA sequencing and library prep
  • Aggregate fractionation for soil fauna analyses
  • Expert in administration of soil protocols regarding C and N analyses 
    • ​Microbial respiration, permanganate oxidizable carbon, protein, total carbon and nitrogen, ammonium + nitrate, soil texture, aggregate stability​​
​Statistical Skillsets​
  • ​Downstream processing of amplicon data
  • Structural equation modeling
  • Univariate and multivariate statistical analyses
​

Future Interest

  • Nematode phenotypic trait adaption to climate change​
  • Development of nematode genus library for rapid identification of free-living nematodes​
  • Nematode-microbe interactions at micro-spatial scales​