I am a chemist combining technical expertise in nanotechnology with a strong focus on policy and outreach. I am currently a Technical Analyst at the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, where I have two tasks. First, I advise and assist NIOSH on their programs on the health and safety implications of emerging technologies, including nanotechnology, synthetic biology, and artificial intelligence. Second, I serve as the NIOSH Wikipedian-in-Residence, where I contribute and improve Wikipedia articles on workplace health and safety topics as a high-visibility means of public outreach.
I have 14 years of research experience specializing in materials applications of DNA nanotechnology. Specifically, I developed dynamic nucleic acid systems with the ability to respond to and control their chemical and physical environment in intricate ways, and the computational methods by which these systems can be designed. I did my dissertation work in Peng Yin's lab at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, and a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Biomolecular Science and Engineering at the U. S. Naval Research Laboratory. Before that, I worked in the labs of David Liu at Harvard, Peter Dervan and James Heath at Caltech, and Nadrian Seeman at NYU.