My name is Paul Snyder and I’m a graduate student in Dr. Andrew Blaustein’s lab at Oregon State University, pursuing a PhD.

My research interests lie somewhere near the intersections of disease ecology and ecoimmunology. That is to say that I’m interested in how diseases work and how immune systems work, but I’m especially interested in how disease and immunity interact on individual, population and ecosystem scales.

Here at OSU I’m working with amphibians, which are currently experiencing drastic world-wide population declines. A number of factors may play a role population declines in amphibians such as habitat loss, pollution, disease, changing climate, and more. We examine the role of disease in these declines.

Prior to attending OSU I worked for nearly three years as the laboratory manager for Dr. Vanessa Ezenwa at the University of Georgia’s Odum School of Ecology, where we examined the role of parasites in disease, in various ungulates.

Now I’ll skip past tediously listing my tech jobs and the details of my undergraduate career to get to the interesting stuff!

I grew up writing computer games and playing musical instruments, and was sure I’d have a career in programming or music. I tried going to school for computer programming, but programming classes took something I loved, something amazing and artistic, and made it painfully dull. I decided to relegate programming to a hobby.

Then I decided to try the music gig, because, how hard can it really be to make it as a rock star. The answer: insanely hard. We can leave it at that.

For a decade, I worked in a middle management position in retail, splitting my time off between my never-going-to-be-a-career hobbies, and trying to keep on top of the latest scientific advances. Until one day a friend suggested I return to school to become a scientist and contribute to the latest advances myself.

I can honestly say since my first experience in a real lab, contributing to real science, I’ve never looked back. With every new milestone in my science career, the work somehow becomes more rewarding. Whether seeing my work in print, or meeting like minded individuals at conferences, I am officially living the dream!