About | Erik Poppleton

Background

Originally from the dry mountains and valleys of Utah, I've since lived the academic life, moving on to a new city for each new research direction. I've wandered through many scientific fields, from biophysical characterization of artificial collagen-like molecules during my bachelors at Tufts University, to digging holes in the high-altitude sun for a soil biogeochemistry internship at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, to a PhD which mixed experiments, simulations, and software infrastructure for the Molecular Programming field at ASU, to my current position as a postdoc using simulations to understand RNA interactions at Heidelberg University and the MPI for Polymer Research. Each new position has been a new opportunity to explore and grow as a scientist and as a person.

Two things have driven my scientific journey: a deep love of the natural world and an insatiable curiosity about complex systems. I started both my bachelors and PhDs convinced I was going to study life-across-scales, first in wildlife ecology, and then in bioremediation of human-impacted soils. Clearly from my resume, I didn't keep that focus, and kept coming back to a question at the other end of the length-scale: how can we design materials from by controlling molecules themselves? Nevertheless, when not at the lab, I can often be found wandering the nearest mountains, pausing to take photos of mushrooms and enjoying the susurrations of the leaves. Check out the Research page to learn more about my current research.