I am interested in understanding the molecular basis of aging. Individual age is the primary risk factor for the majority of the top causes of death in the United States and worldwide. As our population grows older, aging is increasingly a central problem for both individual quality of life and the economics of societal health. Understanding the molecular architecture that drives aging will reveal key intervention points to extend healthy human lifespan, simultaneously delay onset of multiple categories of age-associated disease, and develop targeted treatments for specific pathologies. I use a combination of systems biology, comparative genetics, and molecular physiology to understand the molecular processes that underlie aging and drive age-associated disease. A major current focus of my work is on understanding the role of tryptophan metabolism through the kynurenine pathway in the aging process, particularly the interaction with stress resistance, inflammation, and NAD metabolism. A second focus of the lab is understanding molecular mechanisms governing cellular and organismal response to multiple, simultaneous stressors. Development of novel methods in robotics, imaging, image analysis, and machine learning have become an integral part of my approach to solving new problems in aging biology.