Meet The Team

Research Services Professional

Crystal R. Musser, M.S.
(she/her)

Crystal R. Musser is a Research Services Professional at Claw Lab, where she manages the wet lab and serves as a bioinformatician for the Nicotine Metabolomics project. This project explores the interindividual genetic variation impacting nicotine metabolic rates and smoking cessation success. Born and raised in Colorado, Crystal holds a B.S. in Biology, Biomedical Sciences from the University of Northern Colorado and an M.S. in Bioinformatics from Johns Hopkins University. She is dedicated to addressing inequities in healthcare, aiming to reduce persistent health disparities. Crystal is enthusiastic about advancing interventional clinical research by integrating this research into personalized medicine applications by informing optimal treatment guidelines that are culturally, ethically, and socially appropriate using targeted pharmacogenomic biomarkers.

Research Associate

Matthew Blake
(he/him)

Matt is a Research Associate that began his time in the Claw Lab in September of 2024 after working in industry on product & process development and exploratory R&D in the fields of biologics, medical devices, and tissue engineering. His research focuses on multiplex assays of variant effects, particularly in CYP genes. He is currently working on conducting a Deep Mutational Scanning assay on CYP2A6.

Community Engagement Program Manager

Kyle Coulon

(he/him)

Kyle grew up in central New York state and has strong family ties to the Onondaga Nation. As Community Engagement Program Manager, he focuses on outreach and communicating research results with indigenous community partners. Kyle is currently planning a large scale community event in Summer 2025 and exploring future collaborations.

Qualitative & Mixed Methods Researcher

Lucas Rozell

(any pronouns)

Lucas is a medical anthropologist who works as a Qualitative and Mixed Methods Researcher with the Claw Lab. He is heavily engaged with the bioethics research projects and genetic literacy efforts that the lab is involved with. At the moment, he is working on projects relating to ethical engagement of biobank participants through the CCPM Biobank, community deliberations regarding a new genetic research policy for the Navajo Nation, a survey regarding educational videos about genetics for a Navajo audience, and Dr. Claw's PrIME Indigenous Mentoring Program. He is also on the planning committee for the Voices of the Diné Summit.

Post-Doctoral Researcher

Kendra Ferrier, PhD

(she/her)

Kendra is a post-doctoral researcher in the Claw Lab. Her research interests involve conducting personalized medicine research within and across diverse populations. Her main research project in the claw lab is assessing the relationship of epigenetic markers, genetic markers, and nicotine metabolism to improve tobacco cessation interventions in American Indian communities.

Post-Doctoral Researcher

Jack Staples, PhD

(he/him)

Jack is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Biomedical Informatics at CU Anschutz. He previously earned a PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences and a Bachelor’s in Chemical Engineering. He also completed an industry co-op in the Bioinformatics Department at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Jack is working on developing and applying statistical genomics methods towards characterizing the contribution of genetics, environment, and sociodemographic factors to human disease risk (e.g., cardiovascular, metabolic, autoimmune) and pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics of small molecule drugs and hormones (e.g., nicotine).

PhD Student, Human Medical Genetics and Genomics Program

Carissa Sherman

(she/her)

Tribe: Diné (Navajo)

​

Carissa is a PhD Candidate in the Human Medical Genetics and Genomics PhD program at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.  Her research examines pharmacogenetic variation across global populations as well as the ethical, legal, social, and cultural implications of genomics research. Her proposed thesis will focus on understanding pharmacogenetic variation within nicotine metabolism to improve tobacco cessation efforts within American Indian communities. Her mother's side is from Ganado, AZ and her father's side is from Phoenix, AZ, and Carissa is a member of the Navajo (Diné) tribe.

PhD Student, Human Medical Genetics and Genomics Program

Shalom Gutierrez Diaz-Henry

(she/her)

Shalom is a second-year PhD student in the Human Medical Genetics and Genomics Program at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. She is investigating the evolution of pharmacogenetics across species and the evolutionary history of pharmacogenetics in humans. She's currently working on expanding a bioinformatics pipeline that explores the evolutionary relationship of different vertebrate species including humans.