Hi! I’m a graduate student in the Department of Physics at UCSB, working with Prof. Leon Balents and Prof. Murphy Niu. I'm broadly interested in many-body physics—especially in understanding how exotic phases emerge in quantum systems and in designing tools to detect and explore them. As part of Prof. Niu’s lab, I’m currently looking into ways to improve the performance of variational quantum algorithms like VQE by weaving physically motivated structures into the optimization process. I get excited about using ideas from many-body physics to inspire better quantum algorithms—and about the chance to use quantum hardware to probe complex quantum phenomena in new ways. I find a lot of joy in mentoring and collaborative work, and outside of research, I love reading, painting, dancing, and spending time in nature.