About me

     I began my scientific training at my home state school of Arizona State University, where, as a young student, I first engaged in condensed matter physics research under the tutelage of Dr. Nicole Herbots. Upon the completion of a B.S. in Physics and a B.A. in Philosophy from ASU in 2017, I wanted to pursue further studies in solid state physics and was accepted into the physics Ph.D. program at the University of California Santa Cruz.

     While at UCSC, I worked in the lab of Professor David Lederman performing thin film crystal growth and crystallographic, magnetic, and electronic characterization of thin film crystals. In 2024 I successfully defended my Ph.D. thesis, in which I studied antiferromagnetic insulators and topological insulators. Among my proudest achievements from my Ph.D. work were growing novel antiferromagnetic insulator - topological insulator heterostructures and implementing topological Dirac fermion theory to model transport behavior in topological insulators for the first time. 

     After receiving my Ph.D. in physics from UCSC, I moved to the Washington D.C. metropolitan area to accept a position at the Laboratory for Physical Sciences, a partner research facility between the National Security Agency and the University of Maryland, as a postdoctoral associate. At LPS I am a member of the Advanced Manufacturing and Sensing group under Dr. Adam Friedman, conducting research in the national strategic priorities of next generation engineering materials, novel sensing, and advanced manufacturing.