Welcome!

About Me

My name is Doug. I’m a microbiologist, biochemist, and data scientist with expertise spanning laboratory science, multi-omics analysis, and computational biology. My work sits at the intersection of benchtop science and computational analysis, using mass spectrometry, sequencing technologies, and statistical modeling to study the molecular relationships between microbial communities and human health.

Research Interests

I’m broadly interested in host-microbiome interactions and the mechanisms by which microbial communities shape host physiology at the molecular level. My doctoral research centered on microbial bile acid metabolism—specifically the enzymatic mechanisms and physiological consequences of bile acid conjugation by intestinal bacteria—but my interests extend to multi-omics integration across metabolomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, and microbiome profiling more generally. I’m drawn to questions that connect molecular detail to systems-level biology, and to the development of novel assays and analytical methods that make complex biological data more tractable and interpretable.

Background and Experience

I completed my Ph.D. in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics at Michigan State University in 2024, working in the lab of Dr. Robert Quinn. My doctoral work led to discoveries about expanded bile acid diversity driven by microbial bile salt hydrolases, published in Nature. During my graduate training I also spent time at the Wellcome Sanger Institute developing skills in metagenomic and phylogenetic analysis.

Since graduating, I have applied and expanded these skills in an industry setting, working on multi-omics projects across a diverse range of applications—analyzing and interpreting metabolomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, and microbiome data to deliver actionable insights. This experience has deepened my expertise in assay development, data integration, and translating complex results into scientific and business value.

My undergraduate training at The Ohio State University was in Microbiology (cum laude), where I investigated Staphylococcus aureus aggregation in the context of periprosthetic joint infection and studied burn wound healing models.

Skills and Tools

My laboratory expertise includes targeted and untargeted metabolomics by LC-MS/MS, 16S amplicon sequencing, anaerobic and aerobic bacteriology, enzyme kinetics, molecular cloning, and immunohistochemistry. Computationally, I work in R and Python for statistical analysis, data visualization, and machine learning, with experience in high-performance computing for large-scale analyses.