WiserIT

I am currently a student at the University of Montana.  I will graduate in the spring of 2008 with three degrees (a B.A. in Cellular and Molecular Biology, a B.S. in Micriobiology w/minor in chemistry, and a B.A. in French Language and Literature).  I have long been involved in the social justice and environmental sustainability movements.  I am the president of the UM Students for Peace and Justice (www.peaceandjusticefilms.org), as well as a board member for the Jeannette Rankin Peace Center (www.jrpc.org).  I have been involved with the Biomimicry Institute and the Biomimicry Guild for the past year (www.biomimicry.org).  I completed the Biologist at the Design Table training last May, and I interned as a teaching assistant for the University of Montana's Biomimicry course last semester.  I am especially interested in molecular biomimetics and its applications to sustainable energy.

I have worked in Dr. James Gannon's environmental and industrial microbiology laboratory for two and a half years (http://dbs.umt.edu/facilities/nyack_observatory/default.htm).  I have completed a variety of projects in microbial physiology, molecular genetics, biochemistry, immunology and microbial ecology.  I am currently investigating a consortium of bacteria that are capable of mineralizing the biocide sodium dimethyldithiocarbamate.  With the help of a grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, I assembled a cross-disciplinary team including a chemist, a computational mathematician/physicist and myself  to address this complex problem (http://miles.dbs.umt.edu/miles-participants/honors-fellowship.php).  We are watching how substrate concentrations and population dynamics change over time so that we can try and better understande the principles of consortium based metabolism.  Our ultimate goal is to construct a Monod model to describe the system, and, if time and funding permit, a boolean gene network.  This project, in addition to deepening our understanding of microbial consortia, has applications in bioremediation and environmentally friendly disposal of industrial waste.  I hope to publish my findings by the end of next year.

In addition to my science background, I am fluent in French.  I lived in Voiron, France, for one year and taught an English conversation course in a French high school.  Academically, I have studied French literature, focusing on the surrealists and the existentialists.  I have recently completed a translation of one of my father's collections of poems entitled "Connemara Moonshine" and I am now waiting to hear back from publishers.  During my biomimicry training, which involved scientists and engeneers from all over the globe, I was able to translate some of the curriculum for the representatives from Belgium.