About the PI

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Education and interests: I grew up in Austin Texas, received my undergraduate degree in Molecular Biology with Highest Honors from the University of Texas, Austin and subsequently received my MD PhD from the University of Michigan as part of the Medical Scientist Training Program.  My graduate work in the lab of Michele Swanson focused on the regulation of bacterial virulence and macrophage cytoplasmic response to flagellin via inflammasome activation. My postdoctoral fellowship in the lab of Richard Locksley examined the regulation and function of group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s). My research group was established at UCSF in 2015. We study the regulation and niches of tissue-resident lymphocytes. We are interested in how tissue-resident lymphocytes cross-talk with stromal cells to initiate beneficial and pathologic immunity.

Clinical training: I completed my residency in clinical pathology and fellowship in hematopathology at UCSF in 2011 and 10-year re-certification in 2021.  I continue to practice part-time as an attending hematopathologist focusing on clinical flow cytometry and interpretation of wet hematology (blood, body fluids, and coagulation).

Teaching: I actively teach at multiple levels, including pathology residents and fellows, medical students, graduate students, and dental students. I am the assistant director of the UCSF first-year medical school Pathogens and Host Defense course with a focus on immunology teaching. I am the co-director of a Biomedical Sciences (BMS) mini-course that provides a deep-dive on tissue-resident immunity.

Selected Honors and Awards:

  • 2022 Most ‘Highly Cited Researchers’ over past decade, top 1%, Clarivate.

  • 2021 UCSF Medical School ‘Foundations Curriculum” Teaching Award.

  • 2019 AAI Travel Award

  • 2017 Milstein Young Investigator Award, ICIS 

  • 2017 New Frontiers Research Awardee, UCSF 

  • 2017 AAI Travel Award

  • 2016 Larry L. Hillblom Junior Investigator Award

  • 2014 Clinical Scientist Research Development Award (K08), UCSF

  • 2009 Chief Resident, University of California San Francisco

  • 2006 Alpha Omega Alpha Medical Honors Society, University of Michigan

  • 2006 Ward J. MacNeal Distinguished Dissertation Award, University of Michigan

  • 1999 The Dean’s Honored Graduate in Molecular Biology, University of Texas

  • 1998 Phi Beta Kappa

  • 1998 Research Fellowship Award, University of Texas

  • 1995 National Merit Scholarship, University of Texas