About me

I research the Earth’s ocean, its physics and motion, and its entangled eddies, turbulence, currents, and waves. I do a lot of math and write code that runs on supercomputers. In the distant past, I went to sea. I love to learn and to teach, to think about past and future, and to run, climb, ski, and explore the landscapes of Earth.

Long ago, I grew up in a Boston suburb. Later, I studied Aerospace Engineering and worked on on combustion in porous media, space propulsion, and wind energy in Ann Arbor before moving to San Diego to pursue a PhD in 2010. I worked with Eric Lauga on locomotion, with Bill Young on nonlinear waves, and with both on microorganism mixing. I received a PhD from UCSD in May of 2016 for a dissertation titled On the coupled evolution of oceanic internal waves and quasi-geostrophic flow. Along the way, I fell in love with running, climbing, backcountry skiing, and surfing.

I moved back to Boston in November 2016 to work at MIT on ocean mixing, parameterization of oceanic processes, large eddy simulation, and ice climbing.

An abbreviated curriculum vitae (pdf)

Work

  • since 2019: Research Scientist, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • 2016–2018: Postdoctoral Fellow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • 2014–2016: Teaching Assistant and Graduate Research Assistant, University of California, San Diego
  • 2009–2010: Research Engineer, Accio Energy

Teaching

  • Fall 2015: Teaching Assistant, Introduction to Mathematical Physics
  • Spring 2015: Teaching Assistant, Introduction to Mathematical Physics
  • Winter 2014: Teaching Assistant, Fluid Dynamics II

Education

  • PhD, University of California, San Diego (2016)
  • MSE, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (2010)
  • BSE, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Magna Cum Laude (2009)

Awards

  • NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellowship (2016–2018)
  • Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award, Dept of Mech and Aero Engineering, UCSD (Spring 2016)
  • Focht-Powell Graduate Fellowship, UCSD (2010–2013)