After receiving as B.S. in microbiology from Auburn University, I was hired by the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, Ga. There, I designed DNA-based detection and diagnostic tools to decrease public health costs and response times . After fives years, I decided to move away from clinical research and accepted a position at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. My research goals were to find and annotate microbial genes present in environments deemed hazardous by the Department of Energy. It was after creating hundreds of gigabytes worth of DNA sequence that I got my first experiences with data science.
