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- 2nd Year Ph.D.
- Hometown: Chesapeake, VA
- Undergrad: Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond VA, BS in Forensic Sciences
- Extracurricular Activities: In my free time, I enjoy doing pottery at the Memorial Union Workspace, watching movies, and
going out around Ames and Des Moines with my friends.
- When I first visited Iowa State, I was really impressed by the diversity of research here, and knew that this was a place where I could find a lab
that would fit my interests. I also felt that everyone here was so friendly, helpful, and that they genuinely cared that you made the best choice
for you when it came to the final decision of what school to go to. It was great to know that I would be coming to a place where I could really
explore my interests and know that I would have people around me I felt comfortable working with for the next few years of my life.
- I am currently working on eye evolution in scallops. Scallops have eyes at two life stages, an eyespot as a swimming larvae,
and also up to 100 mirror eyes as an adult. The two retinas of the adult scallop eye each have a separate photoreceptor cell type,
and the larval photoreceptor cell type is unknown. I will be investigating the photoreceptor cells and their phototransduction pathways
in both the adult scallop eye and the larval scallop eye to gain insight into the diversity of cell types in found in eyes and begin to look
at how the diversity developed. I also plan to compare the photoreceptor cells and phototransduction pathways found in the scallop
eyes to those found across animal taxa to look into the evolutionary history of these components of eyes.
- At the moment, I am not sure of where I want to go exactly in my future career. I definitely want to stay in research
as much as possible, but I will have to decide if I will stay in academia or go to industry. I still have several years left here, so I certainly have time to decide!
