I am a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania (PhD candidate, political science, Fall 2023) and at the RAND Corporation (adjunct). My research focuses on a number of topics related to geopolitics and technology, from alliance politics and global governance, to emerging technology and military strategy.
My work seeks to improve our understanding of how groups build and manage organizations charged with using emerging technologies, particularly in international security contexts. Doing so can help make those uses more accountable, effective, and safe. My expertise includes WMD nonproliferation, arms control verification, CBRN emergency and risk management, historical cases of general-purpose technologies, and artificial intelligence (AI), and I continue to broaden my technical skillsets in these areas.
As part of my work on emerging technology, coauthors and I contributed a chapter about the impact of AI on international strategic stability in the Oxford Handbook of AI Governance (Oxford University Press, 2022) and have published other work on international confidence-building measures for AI in Orbis. In my dissertation work on alliance politics and coalitions, I use archival research and introduce a new data set to examine how integrated command and control institutions in international military coalitions can solve and create problems encountered in making military strategy. Part of this work has been published in the peer-reviewed volume, Understanding Battlefield Coalitions (Routledge, 2024). In total, my research has received over $36,000 in grant funding and research support.
During 2022-23, I was a predoctoral fellow with the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin and a non-resident Hans J. Morgenthau Fellow with the Notre Dame International Security Center. In 2021-22, I completed a U.S. Institute of Peace–U.S. Department of Defense Minerva Peace and Security Scholar dissertation fellowship. I was a 2021 Shawn Brimley Next Generation National Security Fellow with the Center for a New American Security in Washington, D.C.
Prior to coming to Penn, I worked in security policy and geopolitical risk analysis, serving as a Nunn-Lugar Fellow at the U.S. Department of Defense. While at the Pentagon, I contributed to the Department’s counter-ISIL team as the country director for Jordan in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Policy) from 2015 to 2017, and I supported WMD nonproliferation efforts in the Asia-Pacific region by advising on Cooperative Threat Reduction program oversight matters from 2013 to 2015. I have also conducted research at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, and the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. My policy commentary has appeared in War on the Rocks, the Washington Post “Monkey Cage” blog, and The National Interest.
At the University of Pennsylvania, I have taught Introduction to International Relations as an instructor of record and, in 2021, received recognition for my teaching as a finalist for Penn's Prize for Excellence in Graduate Student teaching.
I hold an M.A. with distinction in nonproliferation and terrorism studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and a B.A. summa cum laude in Russian from Middlebury College. I currently serve on the executive board of the Board of Directors for the Middlebury Alumni Association.
My work seeks to improve our understanding of how groups build and manage organizations charged with using emerging technologies, particularly in international security contexts. Doing so can help make those uses more accountable, effective, and safe. My expertise includes WMD nonproliferation, arms control verification, CBRN emergency and risk management, historical cases of general-purpose technologies, and artificial intelligence (AI), and I continue to broaden my technical skillsets in these areas.
As part of my work on emerging technology, coauthors and I contributed a chapter about the impact of AI on international strategic stability in the Oxford Handbook of AI Governance (Oxford University Press, 2022) and have published other work on international confidence-building measures for AI in Orbis. In my dissertation work on alliance politics and coalitions, I use archival research and introduce a new data set to examine how integrated command and control institutions in international military coalitions can solve and create problems encountered in making military strategy. Part of this work has been published in the peer-reviewed volume, Understanding Battlefield Coalitions (Routledge, 2024). In total, my research has received over $36,000 in grant funding and research support.
During 2022-23, I was a predoctoral fellow with the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin and a non-resident Hans J. Morgenthau Fellow with the Notre Dame International Security Center. In 2021-22, I completed a U.S. Institute of Peace–U.S. Department of Defense Minerva Peace and Security Scholar dissertation fellowship. I was a 2021 Shawn Brimley Next Generation National Security Fellow with the Center for a New American Security in Washington, D.C.
Prior to coming to Penn, I worked in security policy and geopolitical risk analysis, serving as a Nunn-Lugar Fellow at the U.S. Department of Defense. While at the Pentagon, I contributed to the Department’s counter-ISIL team as the country director for Jordan in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Policy) from 2015 to 2017, and I supported WMD nonproliferation efforts in the Asia-Pacific region by advising on Cooperative Threat Reduction program oversight matters from 2013 to 2015. I have also conducted research at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, and the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. My policy commentary has appeared in War on the Rocks, the Washington Post “Monkey Cage” blog, and The National Interest.
At the University of Pennsylvania, I have taught Introduction to International Relations as an instructor of record and, in 2021, received recognition for my teaching as a finalist for Penn's Prize for Excellence in Graduate Student teaching.
I hold an M.A. with distinction in nonproliferation and terrorism studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and a B.A. summa cum laude in Russian from Middlebury College. I currently serve on the executive board of the Board of Directors for the Middlebury Alumni Association.
Born and raised in Arizona, I have lived and worked in Middlebury, Vermont; Irkutsk, Russia; Monterey, California; Vienna, Austria; Richland, Washington; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Austin, Texas. I currently reside in Washington, D.C.
I am an avid traveler, sporadic hiker and yogi, lapsed pianist, prospective triathlete, and a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community.
I am an avid traveler, sporadic hiker and yogi, lapsed pianist, prospective triathlete, and a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community.