Welcome to my webpage! I am a third year graduate student in Lisa Sloan's Paleoclimate and Climate Change Research Group and Erik Asphaug's Planetary Science Group. For more on my specific research currently in progress, check here, but in general my interests lie in how the Earth and its inhabitants interact. For example, how does an impact effect the climate, and how does this relate to the long and short term effects on the biosphere? I am also very interested in looking at surface processes on other planets; for example, what is Mars climate like? For more on my career interests, click here.
My arrival at the lovely campus of UC Santa Cruz was after some time in the "real world". Four years prior to entering the graduate program in the Earth Sciences department at UCSC, I graduated from Stanford University with a B.S. in Biology. Stanford provided many challenges, but was a wonderful atmosphere, in large part due to the wonderful assortment of interesting, driven, motivated people. After Stanford, I interned at the San Francisco Zoo, exploring the possibility of becoming a veterinarian. The SF Zoo is a wonderful place to visit and work- how can you not be happy being outdoors all day and working with animals? Though my time at the zoo was extremely rewarding, I realized that the veterinary career was not for me. During this time I realized that a constant passion of mine, space sciences and exploration, could indeed be a viable career path. I was determined to get a job at NASA Ames Research Center... and I did! I spent 2.5 wonderful years at Ames, largely supporting life science payloads (supporting research experiments in their path to flight), but dabbling in other ventures as well. (Check out this cool educational website I contributed to: Astroventure.) It was at Ames that I was fortunate enough to be exposed to the geological sciences and their relation to NASA's work. I realized how much biology and geology interact, and that I wanted to further my education by way of the geosciences.
So, that is how I have ended up here! Returning back to school was a great decision, one that I did not take lightly. I am very excited about my next few years at UC Santa Cruz and the exciting endeavors to come!
These are a few of my fav-o-rite things:
The Harvard Forest- I interned here the summer between junior and senior years in college.
Internet Movie Database- The best resource for all your movie trivia questions.
TiVo- If you don't know what it is, you HAVE to find out!
NASA's Planetary Science Summer School- A week at JPL designing a mission to Europa- a great week with a bunch of amazing people!!!
Friday Night Waltz- My favorite type of ballroom- a great way to spend a Friday night