Biography

As early as I can remember, I dreamed of becoming a paleontologist. As my scientific interests expanded, I envisioned myself in a variety of different fields, but still wondered paleontology was actually where I belonged. During my second year at McGill University, I had the chance to join a field course in paleontology. After shoveling through sixteen tons of rock, I found a tyrannosaurid tooth and thought, 'I was born to do this.' Later, my interest in science outreach led me to the National Park Service, where I worked at John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, and Grand Canyon National Park. I began my MPhil at Cambridge in October 2019, and created an atlas of tinamou wing musculature using CT scans. Tinamous are the only flighted members of the Palaeognathae (ostriches and kin), the sister clade to all other modern birds. As a PhD student, I will use data from this project to reconstruct the ancestor of palaeognaths. Reconstructing this ancestor will shed light on the common ancestor of modern birds and help explain their extraordinary diversification into thousands of species. I am delighted to join this incredible community and continue my research at Cambridge as a Gates scholar.

Previous Education

McGill University Honours Biology 2017