I'm a postdoctoral researcher in the Division of International Epidemiology and Population Studies (DIEPS) at the Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health. My current research focuses on influenza epidemiology and transmission dynamics, and particularly how genetic evolution of the flu virus affects variation in the size and severity of seasonal epidemics, both within the United States and at a global scale. I completed my PhD in 2018 in Dr. Lauren Ancel Meyer’s lab at The University of Texas at Austin. My dissertation research combined field behavioral observation data, metagenomic sequencing, and computational and statistical methods to study how contact networks in wildlife influence bacteria transmission and gut microbiome composition. This work focused on a population of wild Verreaux’s sifaka inhabiting Kirindy Mitea UNESCO Biosphere in western Madagascar and was in close collaboration with the Sifaka Research Project, a long-term research study in Kirindy Mitea.