Postdoctoral Scholar

Hi

I'm Carl. I was born and raised in Casterton, a small town in rural Australia, and am a first-generation high school and university graduate. In 2018, I completed my undergraduate degree in Biotechnology at Flinders University in Adelaide, South Australia, before moving to The Australian National University (ANU) to complete an Honours research year with Dr Simon Williams in 2019. My thesis, titled 'The structure and RNA decapping activity of flax rust effector AvrM14', was awarded the University Medal and the Director's Prize for Honours. I commenced my PhD in 2020, remaining in the Williams lab. During my PhD I published review and research articles (see Publications tab), including a paper in Science describing how fungal pathogens hijack plant phosphate signalling to promote disease. My thesis was awarded Best Thesis of 2024, and this research ignited a deep curiosity for plant-microbe interactions. I am now a Resnick Pioneer Postdoctoral Fellow in the Demirer Lab at Caltech, where I am engineering beneficial soil microbes for plant health applications, with a focus on targeted pathogen biocontrol.