About

I grew up in Boise, Idaho and completed my undergraduate degree at Boise State University, majoring in physics and applied mathematics with a minor in computer science. I completed my PhD in astronomy and astrobiology at the University of Washington, where I also helped to organize a local chapter of Astronomy on Tap and spent several years running the UW planetarium. I'm now a postdoc at UCSC, working with Natalie Batalha's group to understand the diversity of exoplanets using JWST observations.

Research

My research interests span all aspects of exoplanetary systems, from host stars, to exoplanets themselves, and to their potential companions, exomoons. During my PhD I developed on a method of mitigating the effects of stellar variability in order to enable detection of small bodies in high-precision light curves. I've also used Gaussian processes to measure the rotation of thousands of stars observed by K2. As a postdoc I'm working with the JWST COMPASS program to understand the atmospheres of sub-Neptunes. I want to understand the diversity of these worlds and how planetary formation and evolution processes shape the population. Besides sub-Neptunes, I'm also interested in understanding how stellar variability and instrumental systematics impact JWST transmission spectroscopy, and I'm excited by the prospect of detecting exomoons and constraining their populations with JWST.
For more information on my current projects, see my research page.