I am a PhD student in Dr. Jarmila Pittermann’s lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz. My interests are in wildfire and drought, and how they impact plant communities. Specifically, I am interested in xylem structure and function in trees following wildfire. Using a physiological approach, my goal is to understand forest resilience across plant communities that are prone to drought and wildfire events.

I earned my B.S. in Environmental Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley in 2013. Since then, I have held research positions in Dr. Whendee Silver’s lab (UC Berkeley and Puerto Rico) and Dr. Max Moritz’s lab (UC Santa Barbara). I spent five years working on projects spanning plant ecology, plant physiology, biogeochemistry, and fire ecology. I started my PhD at UCSC in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology in 2018. My dissertation research investigates the impacts of fire on tree physiology. I am currently seeking jobs in research pertaining to forest health and recovery following fire and/or drought.