About Me

I am a finishing (sixth year) graduate student in astronomy and astrophysics at Steward Observatory in Tucson, AZ. I am a current Jaimeson Fellow and former NSF Fellow and PEO Scholar Award recipient. I will be joining Los Alamos National Laboratory in September as a Metropolis Postdoctoral Fellow.

All of my wide-ranging research interests—from Pluto to planetary dynamics to star formation—stem from a long-lived fascination with binary stars. I currently work with Dr. Kaitlin Kratter in the Star and Planet Theory group, so I get to play with fancy supercomputers and think about the coolest things in our galaxy all day.

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I am pursuing a PhD at the University of Arizona with an expected graduation of July 2020. I graduated from the University of Wyoming in 2014 with undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy. I've always been passionate about science communication and education.

To see a listing of my exploits, take a peek at my CV.

CV (pdf)

Teaching and Outreach

I have always been an advocate for science communication and outreach. Astronomy, in my opinion, is the best gateway science. It is a shared experience across language, culture, and education. Therefore, I strive to make astronomy interesting and accessible to everyone. I am especially passionate about (re)igniting an interest in astronomy, physics, and math for teens and adults.

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Research

I use a variety of computational methods to study many topics surrounding star and planet formation and evolution.

The time evolution of star forming cores

We study how star forming cores identified with dendrograms vary in time.

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The architecture of circumbinary systems

We study the impact of a central binary on the dynamical evolution of planetary systems.

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The fate of debris around the Pluto-Charon system

We study the outcomes of debris scattering after the formation of the Pluto-Charon binary.

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Machine learning classification of Kuiper belt populations

We classify observed Kuiper Belt objects with a machine learning algorithm.

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