I am a Postdoctoral fellow within the Terrestrial Ecology lab of Maddy Thakur, and I am also working with the Theoretical Ecology and Evolution lab of Claudia Bank. My doctoral thesis at ETH Zürich was on how bacteriophages influence the evolution of both other bacteriophages and the evolution of their bacterial hosts. I am broadly interested in the ecology and evolution of phages and how they can assert their influence on both bacteria and larger organisms by modifying the fitness of bacteria. Phages can be a reservoir of novel genes to affect bacterial evolution, but they can also be highly detrimental to bacterial populations as predators of bacteria. I am interested in understanding when the outcome of interactions between phages and bacteria benefits or harms these organisms in novel and surprising ways. My research focuses on how phages influence bacterial communities that are under abiotic stress especially how climate change may cause severe disruptions in the normal interactions between phages and bacteria.
