I am currently a M.Sc. student at the University of Alberta, working under the guidance of Dr. Kathleen Munley in the SeaSoN lab! I completed my B.A. in Biology and Neuroscience at Ohio Wesleyan University in 2024. 

I am really a generalist in my research interests. I love just about anything to do with animal behaviour. Ask me about building behaviour, social interactions, mate choice, dominance hierarchies, nonhuman (and human) emotions, or individuality! I also have a side project in the cognitive psychology and neuroscience of environmental aesthetics. I simply can't pick just one interest.  

My current research is on the automation of behaviour scoring in the cichlid A. burtoni. When two males interact (fight) in a resident-intruder assay, one will be come dominant and the other subordinate. These two phenotypes are reversible but exhibit a different and diverse set of behaviours. Many AI labs have developed machine learning programs in an attempt to automate the scoring of these types of behaviours... but are they valid? What behaviours are they good at differentiating and when do they fail? Are they practical for non-AI labs? That is what this AI Skeptic is most interested in. 

I have an interest in guiding my education and research towards the study of nonhuman animal welfare, with an interest in a career in a Zoo environment. I love research and believe in it's intrinsic value, but I want my work to actually benefit the subject of my study; to say thank you to the birds and the fish and the littlest of creatures that I have the privilege to work with. 

Outside of work, I am often playing games with my partner, making some strange artwork, watching cartoons, reading theology or sci-fi, or just existing in nature.