Dan hails from Northeast Ohio. He currently lives outside of Ithaca, New York with his wife, Julia, and their pets (two black cats and a black Labrador Retriever).
Dan earned his A.B. from Princeton University, where he studied ecology and evolutionary biology, played NCAA Division I football, and conducted field research in Kenya using radio telemetry and drone technology to study animal movement and landscape change.
After Princeton, he was a fellow at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, where he studied how the interplay of mutualist and pathogen fungi in soils impacts large-scale patterns of diversity in the tropical rainforest.
Dan completed his Ph.D. at Cornell University as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow, focusing on phytoremediation and the conservation of phosphorus. He is now a Postdoctoral Associate at the Cary Institute for Ecosystem Studies in the MESS Lab.
Outside of science, Dan is an avid reader and photographer. He and his family love to travel — and to learn just how big (and how small!) our world can be.
Field Experience
Research experience across diverse ecosystems and geographies, including subtropical pastures and wetlands, tropical forests, savannas and rangelands, and temperate forests. Trained in first aid, 4×4 driving, remote fieldwork logistics, UAS/drone operations, radio telemetry, and field medicine.
