About Me :)
I grew up in California, surrounded by mountains, coastlines, and the constant sense that the land was alive and changing. Summers meant dry hillsides and long drives along the coast; winters brought rain that turned everything green again. Wildfires were always somewhere in the background — sometimes distant, sometimes close enough to turn the sky orange. Those early experiences made me aware of how quickly landscapes can shift, and how life, especially insects, responds to those changes in quiet but remarkable ways.
As a kid, I loved nature and books. I spent hours outside looking at bugs, collecting shells, and reading about animals and faraway places. I didn’t think of it as science back then — I was just curious about how things worked and how living things managed to fit together. That curiosity stuck with me, and over time it became the foundation for how I see the world and the questions I want to answer.
Now I’m a PhD student in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University, where I study insect locomotion and collective behavior. My work combines computational methods with ecological data and remote sensing to understand how movement links behavior to environment. I’m especially interested in how insects respond to disturbance — things like wildfire or urbanization — and what their behavior can tell us about resilience in the natural world.
Moving across the country was a big shift. I went from the dry hills and coastal air of California to the forests and seasons of New England. It took a while to adjust — the winters, the pace, even the way the light changes throughout the year. But over time, I’ve come to really love it here. There’s a quiet beauty in how the landscape changes so completely with each season, and it’s made me appreciate new rhythms of life and work that I never had before.
Outside of research, I spend a lot of time cooking, hiking, and working on small creative projects. I love sharing meals with friends, exploring trails around New England, and trying things I’ve never done before — whether that’s baking, photography, or learning how to fix something. I like the balance those things give me: they slow me down, help me reset, and remind me that curiosity isn’t just for work. It shows up in everyday life too, in the simple act of noticing and making things with care.
Monthly Newsletter
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