TL;DR
I use big computers to solve big physics. My current research is modelling physics that describes both quantum cosmology and ultra-cold quantum gases by implementing parallel-in-time integration algorithms using high-performance computing in the Julia language.
I love working on and talking about cool problems with cool people; these days this takes the form of working with my students in physics and/or engineering.
Outside of science, I love storytelling through Dungeons & Dragons, disc golf, coffee, movies, and listening to progressive metal (e.g. TOOL).
I'm also trying to do a project in the Go language.
If you are looking for my CV, you can find it here or on my LinkedIn.
My Story
I didn't plan on writing my life story, but here I was sitting on down 03/23/2025 at about noon writing the "system prompt" for Claude so I didn't have to give it context about me every time, and I realized I had actually collected quite a bit that I think describe me, well, in nutshell (a big nutshell, but still a nutshell). I hope you find it helpful when considering where you started and how high you can go.
Before Me
Before I came along, there were my mom and dad. Both grew up (born early to mid 1960s) as the middle child to many siblings in poor families. Their parents fit the zeitgeist of the United States circa 1940. So, maybe needless to say, they grew up to have their own mental and emotional problems. My dad has struggled and overcome issues with alcohol and other, stronger, drug addictions (even being incarcerated for a short time but being released on good behavior); my dad is now a successful and long-time business owner (landscaping) with his partner of going-on 19 years and has been an integral part of the Deming Logging Show since 1997 when his father passed away after being in the same role since 1963. My mother on the other hand...I am confident that because she was the middle child out of 7 (birthdays spanning the from the late 1950s to 1970), she is a narcissist that feels like she is the most loving and caring person, but the instant something doesn't go the way she wants, she freaks out and gets mad and ruins everyone's time; my mother has now been in a stable job providing in-home care for people with special needs for several years (after bouncing from one job to another for several years) (probably because she gets to "save" people) while now living in a fifth-wheel trailer outside her sister's house. And for reasons that God only knows (I am atheist, so, just as a turn of phrase), she never seems to have a car that doesn't have significant problems for more than 2 years at a time.
During Me
Then I came along in mid 1990s. Then in the early 2000's, my parents got divorced. My mom took me back to her small and rural home town to be closer to her 5 siblings (one lived in California) where we lived until I left for college in 2013; my dad stayed in his hometown, where he is to this day.
Finding the Light (Wave)
When I got to college I knew I wanted to major in Physics. There was no question that physics was the coolest thing in the whole wide world; I had taken chemistry, biology, math, writing, history, Spanish, band (concert and marching), and drama, and all the standard stuff in high school (even a computer repair-and-maintenance elective!), but physics was the one that really peaked my interest. Sure we learned things in my sophomore semester and senior year of "Honors Physics", but it was actually watching the show Stargate SG-1 with my grandma while she babysat me when my mom was either at work or trying to, justifiably, have some sort of adult life (e.g. Thursday night bowling league, visiting friends, etc.). But it wasn't even just the show in general, but rather specifically the character of Samantha Carter who not only was a badass soldier, but also a Dr. of Astrophysics that studied wormholes for the Air-Force as well. First I thought I just really liked the episodes that were centered around cool science things like wormholes, black holes, and time dilation, but then I realized that there was a person there that understood and could solve problems that had to do with these ideas! So, I remember quite vividly, I was sitting there at my grandma's house (I wasn't in high-school yet) and I said "I want to be like her; I want to do the cool science stuff she does!". So, I went from actually being really depressed in general to all of a sudden having this calling/inspiration/direction to learn physics and do whatever I could to be like Samantha Carter working on problems that deal with the most fundamental aspects of reality like time and space.
Undergrad and Silver Linings
Fast-Forward to winter quarter my third year at WWU; I’m now fully in a love/hate relationship with physics. I really struggled this quarter (thinking back now, a big chunk of that was probably due to seasonal affective disorder, overloading myself, undiagnosed depression, anxiety, and ADHD) and ended up not passing Modern Physics, which was only offered once a year. I gave it a lot of thought on whether or not I should stay; if I stayed a whole other year, that would be a lot of money and time. I chose to stay because I just can't live without learning and doing physics; so I had a year to fill before I could try Modern Physics again. During that time, since there weren’t any physics classes I could take yet, I decided to also pursue a degree in math.
For a while, this was great! I was just taking math (which gave me insight into some of the absolutely most fascinating things you can't even imagine!) and only focusing on one thing at a time. Then winter came around again, and I had to fight the beast that is the never-ending string of dark, cold days in winter-ridden Bellingham. By now, my original friends, whom I had struggled with the first time, were all in different classes (though we all still hung out outside of class), and I was retaking Modern Physics with mostly new people. Struggling for the second time, I managed to come out on top (barely; it's a hard class!).
Because I ended up gaining that foundation in more math, I actually excelled in the upper-level physics courses that really depended on your competency with manipulating much more abstract math. While I had already taken the necessary math classes to substitute for the Mathematical Physics course (taught by my then research advisor), I took it anyway. Some of the fundamental concepts were the same, but the approach to the problems was very different; this is physics after all, not math, they should be different! What I really learned in that class were how we as physicists can interpret the different mathematical tools we have at our disposal to more accurately model physical phenomena e.g. "Fourier's trick" leads to a clear representation of quantum eigenstates. When I took my senior Quantum Mechanics classes, I didn't know the details of abstract linear algebra and functional analysis to really understand what's going on with Hilbert Spaces, but I did have much more practice with abstract math compared to my peers so I could more easily grasp what was being covered.
I was also interested in doing research with the physics faculty. Most of their topics weren't particularly evoking to me, except one. I ended up working with this faculty for a few years eventually culminating in presenting a poster at the 2019 American Physical Society's (APS) Annual Meeting of the Division of Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics (DAMOP) (I still wear the shirt I got there regularly). I didn't win an awards there, but I did co-win an award for that work and presentation at the annual meeting of the APS Northwest Section (another student from WWU also won; she now does computational atmospheric physics).
So I graduated in the spring of 2019 with a B.S. in Physics, a B.S. in Pure Math, a minor in Astronomy, award winning research experience, a 2.8 total GPA, and a rejection from the WWU Math Master's. Then nothing big happened in the world.
"Unfortunately, there were many qualified applicants..."
After applying to and getting rejected from WWU's Math master's for 2019, applying to and getting rejected from several physics Ph.D programs at schools focusing on Numerical Relativity in 2020, and applying to and getting rejected from several physics masters programs in 2021, I did get accepted by a single school, but it wasn't for physics. Central Washington University, had this little graduate program for a Master's of Science in Computational Science out of the Computer Science Department. It sounded cool enough on paper; I was going to be learning the ins and outs of using specialized computational methods to solve all sorts of problems in all kinds of science like math, physics, chemistry, biology, sociology, etc., and heck, taking my undergrad Computational Physics course made me realize that I really like this stuff; so I applied. After another depressing months-long slough of "Thank you for your application. While there were many qualified applicants..." emails (I usually didn't even have to read more than what's shown in the phone notification), Lo and behold the light that shineth down; I got accepted into one graduate program: Central Washington University's Master's of Computational Science. Oh but it wasn't just that easy, it was both a conditional and probationary acceptance. Because of my lack of coursework in computer science, I could only start the program on the condition that I take an undergraduate class in data structures; I ended up doing at WWU over the summer and found really super cool coming from my background in math (I still remember the boat whenever I think about recursively traversing the nodes of a tree). Because of my 2.8 graduating GPA, I could start the program but on a probationary basis; if I didn't do well the first quarter, I was out. Luckily I was able to take and pass the data structures course (I think with an A-!) over that summer and I did very well in my first quarter of the program (that whole succeeding at the more complicated stuff thing). Though, this was only the beginning of my graduate school journey (for better or for worse).
Your Advisor Makes it or Breaks it
In that first quarter, I also saw that the physics department was offering "PHYS 461: Advanced Computational Physics". I needed a few more credits to be full-time (which would be an ongoing theme); so, I reached out to the instructor, explained who I was and my situation (including that I was remote), and asked if I could take 461 even though I was a graduate student. He replied optimistically and even that "there's a also a graduate version on the books" so there wouldn't be any hassle. So I took the course and had a lot of fun (I made animations of 1D and 2D waves changing their behavior because of more dense spots in the material, and learned about the super cool concepts of CFL condition in numerical PDEs and Energy Drift as a measure of inaccuracy). Near the end of the course, I realized I really liked the professor and he had a lot of experience doing computational physics. So, once again, I reached out and asked if he'd be interested (and have the bandwidth) to be my thesis advisor. Again, he replied optimistically and agreed. That was about 2.5 years ago from the time of writing (03/23/25), and boy howdy has it been a ride since. The searching, filtering, and nailing down a thesis topic, collecting a committee, finding (not submitting!) the paperwork to submit to the graduate college, proposing my topic to the committee, fundamentally changing the focus of the project, actually doing the project, and as of now, writing the report. Andy (my advisor) has been there the whole time, not necessarily doing things, but supporting me while I (learn how to) do them, as a good advisor should; thanks Andy you're the best advisor I could have ever wished for.
Post-Master's & Teaching
I'm not quite done yet from finishing my master's (tentative defense date is 05/16/25 and manuscript needs to be to the committee by 05/02/25), but somehow I'm halfway through my second year of teaching. The Physics department at CWU had two faculty go on sabbatical during the 23-24 academic year (one of which was my advisor), and they were looking for a part-time adjunct physics instructor to teach only for that one year period. I threw my hat in the ring after being advised that "we have some flexibility" when it comes to having a finished graduate degree, I had a nice interview, and the next day I was offered the job. Now, "should I have taken the job?" is a different question. Looking back, I tried to give 100% and each got 50%, never forgetting you need at least 70% to pass. My aunt, who was like a second mom to me, was also dying of cancer during this time. I knew I had to focus on my courses and finish up my thesis as I was planning to graduate that spring, but I knew I just couldn't pass up this opportunity; heck, some people can't get an adjuncting job after their Ph.D. and several post-docs! So I taught for the very first time ever when I stepped into "Physics 104: Physics Inquiry" in September 2023. I finished that year of teaching, and have now been hired at Whatcom Community College (WCC) as an adjunct physics faculty teaching the standard introductory physics with calculus sequence. While there was not enough projected enrollment in physics to warrant hiring me for next quarter, I have also been hired as an engineering adjunct faculty and am set to teach analog circuits for the engineering program next quarter (in about 3 weeks).
After Me
I guess, like anyone else, I would like to have a legacy and be remembered. I'd love to write a book on introductory physics with an emphasis on using computation (something like Computational Introductory Physics), hopefully people would like it enough to keep my name around. Or maybe an endowment for a yearly scholarship for a plucky young physicist interested in the computational side of things. I hope to write a plethora of journal papers, but who are we kidding, nobody reads those.