James grew up in Lake Oswego, OR and moved down to Eugene in 2010 to attend the University of Oregon where he earned my bachelor’s degree in 2014, majoring in Biology with an emphasis in Cellular, Molecular, and Developmental Biology and minoring in Chemistry. He spent the next 7 years in the food and beverage industry, most recently serving as a QA Supervisor at Attune Foods in Eugene. About three years ago James decided to begin a career shift and started taking courses in Python and R. James was admitted to the University of Oregon’s Bioinformatics and Genomics Master’s Program (BGMP) in June 2021 where he applied my programming and statistical skills to answer biological questions, including work with InVivo Biosystems where he constructed a pipeline for analysis of RNAseq data to aid in discovery of anti-aging compounds in C. elegans. The second half of the BGMP entails an internship in a relevant position within the field of bioinformatics and genomics, for which he was fortunate to have the opportunity to complete with the team at CEDAR.