I am broadly interested in food web interactions and nutrient cycling in stream ecosystems and their linkages with the terrestrial ecosystem.  I am particularly interested in how species traits influence structure and function within aquatic systems.

 I completed my master's at the University of Georgia under the advisement of Alan Covich and Stephen Opsahl.  My research was performed at the J.W. Jones Ecological Research Center and was focused on the effects of riparian floodplain forests supplying basal resources to a coastal plain stream and the functional roles of native mussels and an invasive bivalve, Corbicula fluminea.  This work was performed in southwest Georgia on Ichawaynochaway Creek, a tributary to the Flint River.  

Unionid mussels are also the most imperiled fauna in North America, so it is essential to get a better grasp of what they are doing in the system before more species are lost.  To learn more about my research, please see my research interests. These organisms are useful at looking at the base of the food web and are also very important contributors in stream systems by linking the flow of energy from the water column to the benthic environment. 

I just began my doctoral work at the University of Oklahoma in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology program.  I plan to continue my work on freshwater mussels with Dr. Caryn Vaughn.