Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Research Associate, experienced in many types of molecular biology and microbiology assays. Bachelor's of Science in Molecular Biology, and a Minor in Mathematics from Binghamton University. Intellectual interests: I love listening to long-form podcasts, interviews, audio books, and lectures. Some favorite podcasters/authors/professors: Tim Ferris, Sam Harris, Rhonda Patrick, Peter Attia, Lex Fridman, Yuval Noah Harari, Bret Weinstein, Sean Carroll, Douglas Hofstadter. Favorite topics: evidenced-based health and well-being, philosophy of mind, neuroscience, mathematics, machine intelligence, evolutionary biology, ethics, morality, and cutting-edge technologies like robotics, synthetic biology, brain-computer interface. Hobbies: non-dual insight meditation (mindfulness), natural language acquisition (working hard on Swedish).
Cultures filamentous fungi from vials of frozen vegetative mycelium on agar plates Streaks new cultures, organizes growing cultures, monitors growth, separates mixed cultures, harvests mycelium once cultures reach maturity, runs genomic DNA extractions. Experienced programmer, handles all lab data manipulation for the Strain Collection team (Excel and Python), works closely with software developers on LIMS integration with our biology workflow LifeMine is a drug discovery startup made possible by the recent plummet in the cost of DNA sequencing. We sequence the genomes of a diverse set of fungi, then search their genomes for possible leads for novel medicines. More information about the company, the team, and recent publications are all publicly available at lifeminetx.com.
Developed a software plugin for the NIH’s ImageJ to analyze micrographs of slides filled with blood (Java) Performed blood smears and counts in development of an assay for a new type of blood-testing cartridge Created and executed Design Verification Protocols for three additional blood-testing cartridges
Tested tissue samples from ticks and mice for Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacteria that causes Lyme disease Techniques: microscopy, tissue lysis, centrifugation, restriction digest, DNA extraction, rt-PCR, gel electrophoresis Co-authored paper on prevalence of Lyme and co-infections, submitted to the scientific journal, Microogranisms Presented poster at national conference – 2017 Human Biology Association Annual Meeting
Performed Sanger sequencing on mtDNA from blood samples for students to analyze Helped students analyze DNA sequences with software such as MEGA, Sequencher, BLAST, and Plink Performed statistical tests: ANOVA, GWAS, Shapiro–Wilk test, chi square,
Developed a program for the HoloLens™, an “AR/VR mixed reality device” by Microsoft (C++, Python) Program could detect when the user made certain head gestures such as ‘nodding’ using outward-facing cameras Presented the result to professionals in computer vision at a University poster session