Michael was born in Somerset, Pennsylvania and graduated with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Pennsylvania State University in 2020. During his time at Penn State, he conducted research on fluorescence microscopy and plant engineering. in Professor Wayne Curtis’s lab. He attended MIT for his PhD in Chemical Engineering under advisement of Professor Kristala L. J. Prather. His thesis focused on synthetic circuit design and leveraging quorum sensing systems to improve biosynthesis of value-added compounds in Escherichia coli. After graduating in 2025, he joined the Stephanopoulos group where he is conducting strain engineering of Yarrowia lipolytica as well as upstream bioprocess development.