I am fascinated with emerging wildlife fungal diseases and wildlife conservation. I am from Oakland, CA where I grew up exploring our abundance of outdoor spaces and running every trail I could find. Fascinated with physiology and wildlife from a young age, interactions between the environment, microbes and host physiology captivated me early on. I study these interactions in the disease, White-nose syndrome, which has caused catastrophic declines in bat populations in North America. The west coast has the greatest biodiversity of bats in the U.S. thus our research aims to contribute to the conservation of North American bats. I am honored to continue to explore the outdoors to study and conserve wildlife.