People

Amanda De La Torre is an Associate Professor at the NAU School of Forestry, an Affiliate faculty at the School of Informatics, Computing and Cyber Systems, and the Director of the Forest Genomics Lab. After obtaining her PhD from the University of British Columbia (Vancouver, Canada), she worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Umea University (Sweden), and later at the University of California-Davis (California, US). As a forest geneticist, Amanda is interested in understanding how long-generation tree species respond to biotic and abiotic stresses using tools in genomics, transcriptomics, physiology, and epigenomics. In her free time, she enjoys traveling, hiking, and painting.

ResearchGate GoogleScholar

Kailey Baesen (Lab Manager) is interested in genomic approaches to evolutionary biology, bioinformatics and population structure. Over the course of her undergraduate, she had developed deep interests in plant genetics and understanding the natural world around her through a genetic lens. She hopes to use her experience studying biology to help answer questions about how migration, selection and genetics all shape the world around us. Kailey’s graduate research aimed to understand patterns of hybridization and abiotic stress tolerance in Douglas fir. In her free time, you can probably find her in a bookstore, at farmers’ market, or cooking a nice meal with friends.

Sean Collins is a PhD student at the NAU School of Forestry. His research centers around examining how a population, or a community, interact with their environment and respond to stress. His undergraduate research focused on how stress affected metabolic rate and disease resistance in red-backed salamanders. As a M.Sc student, his research focused on using environmental DNA metabarcoding to characterize amphibian communities. His interest in bioinformatics and genetic approaches blossomed as a graduate student. He then made the jump to population genomics and he is interested in learning more about the interplay between genomic variation and stress tolerance. Sean is currently working on the population and quantitative genomics of Ponderosa pine. His other greatest passions, outside of research, are mountain biking and road cycling.

Athena Allen is a Masters student at the School of Forestry. Her thesis includes assessing the levels of hybridization across longitudinal and elevational gradients in the Douglas-fir intervarietal hybrid zone in British Columbia, and find associations between dendrochronology data and molecular markers. Athena is interested in population genomics, genomics insights related to local adaptation and climate change, and how increased genetic knowledge may be able to help strengthen future forests. In her free time, you can find Athena on a mountain trail either hiking with her dog or biking.

ALUMNI

Isabel Silva (undergraduate, Env.Sciences)

Piper Lloyd (undergraduate, Forestry, graduates 2026)

Catherine Young (undergraduate, Forestry, graduates 2026)

Brooke Harris (undergraduate, Env. Sciences, graduated 2024)

Gustavo Lorenzana (Postdoctoral researcher, 2023-2024)

Madison Cathey (undergraduate, Environmental Sciences, graduated 2024)

Isabella Qualls (undergraduate, Biology, graduated 2024)

Nylah Edwards (undergraduate, Biology, graduated 2024)

Laura Figueroa (Postdoctoral researcher, 2022-2024)

Kailey Baesen (MSc student, graduated Dec 2022)

Pablo Peláez (Postdoctoral researcher, 2022-2023)

Mariola Barrera (undergraduate, Forestry 2022-2023)

Max Friedstein (undergraduate, Biology, 2023)

Sharon Holtaway (undergraduate, Forestry, 2021-2023)

Amanda Fitzhugh (undergraduate student, Forestry, 2020-2022)

Lilyana Kolody (undergraduate student, Env. Sciences, 2022)

Lino Reyes (undergraduate student, Forestry, 2021-2022)

Dylan Chandler (graduate student, Env. Sciences, 2020-2022)

Andrew Henning (undergraduate student, Forestry, 2021-2022)

Manoj Kumar S. (Postdoctoral researcher, 2021)

Benjamin Wilhite (MSc student, graduated April 2021)

Matthew Weiss (MSc student, graduated July 2020)

Bobin Liu (Visiting Researcher from Fujian Agricultural University, China, 2018-2019)

Samuel Compton (undergraduate student, Forestry, graduated April 2021)

Charles Stackpole (undergraduate student, Env. Sciences, 2020-2021)

Benjamin Covington (undergraduate student, Forestry, 2018-2019)

Seth Hendrickson (undergraduate student, Biochemistry, graduated April 2021)

Morgan Henson (undergraduate student, Forestry, 2018-2019)