- Profile
Greta Keilman is a lab technician in the Stewart Merrill Lab, where she supports both lab-based experiments and fieldwork aimed at advancing our understanding of the causes and consequences of disease in freshwater ecosystems. Her current work focuses primarily on monitoring zooplankton parasites in the Hudson River and studying trematode parasites at Cary Institute field sites.
Greta has a strong background in freshwater ecology, entomology, and molecular diagnostics. As an undergraduate at the University of Illinois, she worked in a freshwater ecology and disease lab, where she studied how disease influences the predator-prey dynamics of Daphnia. She also engaged in prairie fieldwork, investigating how various environmental stressors affect vegetation cover, pollinator visitation, and soil microbial diversity.
Greta earned her Master’s degree from the University of Illinois, where her graduate research centered on freshwater ecotoxicology. After graduating, she worked as a molecular technologist at Tempus AI, extracting DNA from patient samples to help improve cancer diagnosis and treatment for thousands of patients.