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I'm an applied mathematician who uses dynamical systems to study ecological processes, particularly those that drive outbreaks of mosquito-borne diseases. I am currently an NSF Ascending Postdoctoral Fellow working in the Department of Mathematics at Virginia Tech.
Profiles:
Upcoming Events
January 4, 2026: At the Joint Mathematics Meetings, I will be presenting some early results from work with Christa Seidl of the Maui Forest Bird Recovery Project on Threshold Dynamics in Multi-Host Vector Systems with Wolbachia Control: The Case of Avian Malaria in Hawaiʻi in the Session on Advances in Ecological and Epidemiological Models: Analysis and Applications.
January 7, 2026: At the Joint Mathematics Meetings, I am organizing the Special Session on The Impact of the ASCEND Program: Research and Reflection with Catherine Canizzo and Padi Fuster.
February 8 -13, 2026: I will be attending the workshop on New Mathematical Theory in Eco-Evolutionary Modelling of Host-Symbiont Communities at Banff International Research Station
April 10, 2026: Along with Michael Robert and Sarah Reznikoff, I am helping to organize the Math for All in Blacksburg conference, hosted at Virginia Tech.
July 6 -10, 2026: For the SIAM Annual Meeting in Cleveland, Ohio, I am heading the working group for the Workshop Celebrating Diversity and serving on the conference organizing committee.
Recent Activities
November 14, 2025
New Publication: Routing functions for parameter space decomposition to describe stability landscapes of ecological models (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-025-01554-7 ) with Joseph Cummings (Notre Dame), Jon Hauenstein (Notre Dame), and Elizabeth Gross (University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa) in the Bulletin of Mathematical Biology.
November 7 - 9, 2025
Co-organized a session with Leah LeJeune and presented research at the 18th Annual Symposium on BEER at George Mason University
October 15, 2025
New Publication: Once bitten, twice shy: A modeling framework for incorporating heterogeneous mosquito biting into transmission models in the Bulletin of Mathematical Biology (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-025-01540-z). This work was highlighted in an article in Virginia Tech News!
October 2 - 5, 2025
Attended the American Indian Science and Engineering Society national conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where the Virginia Tech chapter won the Professional Development and Chapter Development award!
May 30 - 31, 2025
Took part in the +Policy Network Policy Camp hosted by the Virginia Tech +Policy Network
May 30 - 31, 2025
Spoke at the 2025 Society for Mathematical Biology annual meeting in Edmonton, Canada in the session on Ecological aspects of vector-borne disease organized by Abby Barlow (University of Bath)
May 30 - 31, 2025
Organized the ʻĀina Momona: Place-based Math Education symposium with Dr. Stacy Potes at the University of Hawaiʻi - West Oʻahu
May 6, 2025
New Publication: My recent collaborative paper with Elisa Van Cleemput, Subodh Adhikari, Karen Castillioni & Lynette R. Strickland on using traditional ecological knowledge to identify biodiversity hotspots has been published in Nature communications earth & environment.
Simulated biodiversity hotspots from traditional ecological knowledge and Western metrics do not always overlap
May 2, 2025
Released a new preprint titled Routing functions for parameter space decomposition to describe stability landscapes of ecological models (https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2505.00128) with Joseph Cummings, Jon Hauenstein, and Elizabeth Gross on the arXiv.
April 17, 2025
Check out my article with Stacy Potes in the April/May issue of MAA Focus on the efforts of mathematics educators in Hawaiʻi to incorporate place-based pedagogy into their classrooms
March 13, 2025
Released a new preprint titled Once bitten, twice shy: A modeling framework for incorporating heterogeneous mosquito biting into transmission models (https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2503.10585) with Michael A. Robert and Lauren M. Childs on the arXiv.
March 3, 2025
Spoke at the University of New Mexico Applied Math Seminar Blending Mosquito Biting Dynamics into Vector-Borne Disease Transmission Models
January 8 - 11, 2025
Spoke in special sessions on Harnessing the Power of Mathematical Models to Understand Population Dynamics, Ecology, and Evolution and The Convergence of AI, Math, and Statistics in Biomedical Research at the Joint Math Meetings in Seattle, Washington
December 9, 2025
Spoke at the Mathematics and Climate Research Network Colloquium on From Traits to Temperatures: Predicting the Risk of Mosquito-Borne Disease Outbreaks. Recording available on YouTube here.
Past Activities
Past Activities
October 24, 2024: Preprint: Fast-lived Vertebrate Hosts Exhibit Higher Potential for Mosquito-borne Parasite Transmission (https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.10.21.619438) with Suzanne M. O’Regan (UGA), John Paul Schmidt (UGA), Barbara A. Han (Cary Institute), John M. Drake (UGA)
September 16, 2024: Preprint: Coexistence of bacteria with a competition-colonization tradeoff on a dynamic coral host (https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.15.612558 ) with Theo Gibbs (Princeton), Joe Brennan (UC Davis), Cynthia Silveira (UMiami), and Lisa McManus (UHMānoa)
September 4, 2024: Presented at the Mathematical Biology seminar at Virginia Tech on A framework for integrating complex mosquito feeding behaviors into disease transmission models
August 5, 2024: Preprint: Comparisons of biodiversity metrics reveal dissimilarities in biodiversity hotspot identification (https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-4522774/v1) with Lynette Strickland (Boston University), Elisa Van Cleemput (Leiden), Subodh Adhikari (UIdaho), and Karen Castillioni (UMinnesota)
June - August 2024: With Drs. Elizabeth Gross and Stacy Potes, I coordinated a seminar on Placed-based Education in Collegiate Mathematics at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
June 30 - July 5, 2024: Attended the Society for Mathematical Biology annual meeting at Konkuk University in Seoul, Republic of Korea to present on Integrating complex mosquito feeding behaviors into disease transmission models
April 4 - 6, 2024Presented on Using traditional ecological knowledge to identify biodiversity hotspots at the AISES Region 7 conference at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia
February 26 - March 15, 2024: Attended the Theory of Microbial Symbiosis workshop at the Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology
January 3- 6, 2024: Presented on Once bitten, twice shy: modeling trade-offs between mosquito biting persistence and vertebrate host defensive behaviors at the Joint Mathematics Meetings in San Francisco, California
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