Human genetics, genomics, & evolution
I’m a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Rajiv McCoy at Johns Hopkins University. I received my PhD in 2024 from the Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology, and Biophysics (CMDB) program at JHU.
I use long- and short-read sequencing data to understand the evolutionary impacts of structural variants and the diversity of gene expression and splicing.
The cells in our bodies accumulate somatic mutations throughout our lives. Some mutations cause overproliferation and can eventually lead to cancer. I developed a model of these evolutionary dynamics in the blood, built with the software SLiM, that incorporates telomere shortening as a cell death mechanism.
When the human genome was first sequenced in 2001, 8% of its most complex regions remained incomplete for the next two decades. I worked with the Telomere-to-Telomere Consortium, which assembled the first ever complete human genome in 2021, to assess how this genome can improve genetics research.
Large genomic rearrangements, called structural variants, are understudied but can have dramatic functional impacts. I used a hybrid genotyping approach to discover these variants on a population-wide scale, and found evidence of a Neanderthal structural variant under selection in southeast Asia.
Recent research on Neanderthals and Denisovans has used gene expression to understand how archaic hominins may have differed from modern humans. In this review, I described the creative methods used to infer archaic hominin gene expression from DNA sequencing data.
| 2022 |
JHU CMDB Program Retreat
Local adaptation and archaic introgression at human structural variant loci |
| 2022 |
T2T-F2F
Human genetic diversity within challenging regions of the genome |
| 2022 |
Advances in Genome Biology and Technology
A complete reference genome improves analysis of human genetic variation |
| 2021 |
eLife Symposium: Evolutionary Medicine
Local adaptation and archaic introgression at human structural variant loci |
| 2021 |
Biology of Genomes, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Local adaptation and archaic introgression at human structural variant loci |
| 2020 |
American Society of Human Genetics
The role of structural variation in human local adaptation |
| 2020 |
Society for Molecular Biology & Evolution | Cancelled due to COVID-19
The role of structural variation in human local adaptation |
| 2024 | Stephen and Carolyn Oppenheimer Thesis Award, JHU Department of Biology |
| 2023 | Margolies Travel Award, JHU CMDB Program |
| 2022 | Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) F31, NIH/NHGRI |
| 2022 | JHU Discovery Award (with Rajiv McCoy, Winston Timp, & Alexis Battle) |
| 2020 | Instructional Enhancement Grant, JHU Center for Teaching Excellence & Innovation |
| 2020 | Travel Grant, JHU Graduate Representative Organization |
| 2020 | Honorable Mention, NSF Graduate Research Fellowships Program |
| 2019 | Adam T. Bruce Fellowship, JHU |
| 2019 | Registration Award, Society for Molecular Biology & Evolution |
| 2014—2018 | Tanner Dean's Scholar, Cornell University |
Funded by the JHU Center for Teaching Excellence & Innovation, I developed open-source teaching modules for an undergraduate course on human genetic variation.
I introduced new biology PhD students to computational biology as a teaching assistant for the CMDB program's Quantitative Biology Bootcamp.
From May 2020 to May 2021, I recreated all 26 varieties of curry from Pokémon Sword and Shield's Curry Dex, so that you don't have to.
An R Shiny app for browsing LD between human structural variants and SNPs, using data from my SV genotyping paper. (There's a lot of data, so it might take a minute to load!)
If you'd like to contact me, feel free to reach out via email or any other platform!
