Michelle Culbertson

MD / PhD Student
NIH F30 Fellow

Michelle grew up on Tempe, Arizona and completed her B.S. in medicinal biochemistry at Arizona State University.  She conducted undergraduate research with John Chaput analyzing the biostability of synthetic nucleic acids, and later with Carlo Maley establishing new model organisms for cancer research, which sparked her interest in evolutionary medicine.

She moved to Salt Lake City to pursue a combined MD/PhD degree and is interested in applying research into host-pathogen coevolution to improve prevention and treatment of infectious diseases.  She is especially interested in studying bats and how they coevolved with key zoonotic pathogens of interest to human health.

In her free time she enjoys hiking, skiing, traveling, reading and swing dancing.