Valerie is the Director of the Wildlife Cancer Observation Network and a PhD student at Arizona State University. She studies all things animal, evolution and cancer related. Her particular interest lies in how cancer affects non-human animals, and how the different evolutionary paths each species has taken might affect how susceptible each one is to cancer. Additionally, she wants to understand how anthropogenic influences might affect cancer in animals and use this as a tool to explore our changing world. In her free time she plays cello, climb rocks, and occasionally trains computers to write poetry.