PhD Candidate Education Education: B.S. - Virginia Tech 2015 Hot Metal Bridge Fellow - University of Pittsburgh 2015-16 Research Research Interests: I'm interested in understanding how plants respond to their environment and how that is dictated by phenotypic and genetic variation. I am planning to compare physical differences in populations of Boechera stricta in multiple environments to understand the basis of phenotypic plasticity. My goal is to understand how populations have used phenotypic plasticity to adapt to their particular surroundings. Studying this will allow me to understand how populations can persist when exposed to novel conditions associated with climate change, such as competition from other species, predators, or an increased range of temperatures.