His research focuses on the biogeochemical role of marine microbes in the Earth system and the process by which genetic and community structures enable specific ecosystem functions. He received his Ph.D. in oceanography and astrobiology from the University of Washington, where he studied the microbial ecology of sea ice and other cold environments. Prior to joining the faculty at Scripps, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University. There he developed new informatics techniques for assessing the ecological function of marine microbial communities in the Palmer Long Term Ecological Research Site off the western Antarctic Peninsula.