Regulated environments
CLIA-certified processing, GMP production, ISO and FDA audits.
Featured research
A new epigenetic layer in human DNA
Ribonucleotides are RNA building blocks that slip into DNA while a cell copies itself. For decades they were treated as mistakes, to be cut out and forgotten.
What the field had written off as damage turned out to carry information.
We mapped roughly one million of them in every human nuclear genome, the first genome-wide picture of where they actually sit. They are not scattered at random. They track gene activity, and processing them shifts how tightly DNA is wound, which ties the chemistry of a genome to its physical shape and to transcription itself. The work also speaks to disorders caused by a failure to clear RNA out of DNA, including rare autoimmune disease.
I am first author, and I led the bioinformatics: the mapping, the genomic feature associations, and the analysis behind the human nuclear ribome.
Meet the researcher
Who you would be working with
I design the methodology, not just the analysis: interpretable models over messy biomedical data, and the frameworks and evaluation standards that decide when to trust what comes out. I started at the bench, which is why I ask how data was made before I ask what it shows.
- Now · UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center. Interpretable AI over EHR, genomic, and multi-omics data for cancer risk prediction.
- 2025–26 · Turing. Advised and led frontier-AI evaluation: STEM expert teams built from scratch, plus the rubrics, failure-mode taxonomies, and QA systems used to judge whether a model's reasoning holds. One programme spanned 200+ subject matter experts.
- 2019–25 · Ph.D., Georgia Tech. Mapped the roughly one million ribonucleotides embedded in every human nuclear genome and showed they are not randomly placed: the human nuclear ribome, tracking gene activity and shifting DNA supercoiling. I led the bioinformatics analyses. Published in Cell (Georgia Tech coverage); awarded the Mark Borodovsky Prize as the programme's top Ph.D. student.
- 2015–19 · MD Anderson, Hanash Lab. Validated protein biomarkers for early cancer detection, including the panel behind this lung cancer risk model.
The thread through all of it: building the systems other people work inside, and auditing the ones that already exist, whether that is a sequencing pipeline, a clinical protocol, or an evaluation framework.
Career highlights
A new epigenetic layer
First genome-wide map of ribonucleotides in human DNA, published in Cell.
$1M Keck Foundation grant
Won on a hypothesis built from my preliminary ribose-seq analysis.
Published widely
Cell, Nature Communications, JAMA Oncology, JNCI, Nucleic Acids Research.
Pan-cancer scale
CCLE and TCGA datasets across 33+ cancer types.
Frontier AI evaluation
Led 200+ SMEs at Turing on LLM reasoning evaluation tied to $1M+ revenue.
Research interests
- Biomedical AI
- Aging-associated epigenetics
- Rare genetic disorders
- Multi-omics integration
- Clinical biomarkers
- Precision medicine
- Immune–brain–gut microbiome triad
Featured projects
Ribonucleotides in the human genome
rNMPs cluster near CpG islands and track with expression and methylation at transcription start sites.
Aicardi-Goutières syndrome mutants
One mutation floods the genome with rNMPs. The other moves where they land. Only one is visible to a count.
RNASEH2A across 35+ cancers
Expression correlation with proliferation and cell-cycle markers across CCLE and TCGA.
Journey
Fifteen years, four institutions, and what came out of each.
Awards and leadership
Eight awards, from the Borodovsky Prize to an NSF conference award, and the societies I have run.
OpenEducation and experience
Mumbai to Albuquerque, with each degree shown alongside the roles held during it.
OpenConferences and talks
Twelve conference presentations and posters, plus eight invited talks and lectures.
OpenSkills and tooling
Languages, machine learning, sequencing, infrastructure, bench work and certifications.
OpenBlog
Genomics, research practice, and the occasional detour.
The RNA hiding inside your DNA
A million RNA letters sit inside every human genome. They are not scattered, and they are not just damage.
Read postBench to terminal: what pipetting taught me about data
Four years at the bench before my first pipeline. It changed how I read every dataset since.
Read postBuilding FeatureCorr: lessons from a small R package
A script became a published package. The statistics were the easy part.
Read postConsulting
I take on a small number of outside engagements in biomedical AI.
Retainers
A standing block of time each month for design review, model critique, and the hard calls.
OpenDeep audits
Fixed scope, written report. Leakage, batch effects, validation design, interpretability.
OpenFrameworks
Evaluation harnesses, benchmarks and standards your team runs without me.
OpenGet in touch
Tell me what you are working on
Collaborations, a question about a paper or a method, or a problem you are stuck on: all of it is welcome, and half-formed is fine. I read every message myself and reply within two working days.
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Based inAlbuquerque, New Mexico
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PublicationsGoogle Scholar
Prefer a document? View my CV, generated from this site and downloadable as a PDF.