Meredith A. Calloway

Profile

Senior Research Biologist with 11 years specializing in molecular ecology and microbial genomics across academic and biotech settings. Proven record leading multi-site field studies and translating sequencing data into actionable conservation and product insights. Reduced sequencing pipeline turnaround by 34% and co-authored 9 peer-reviewed publications in high-impact journals.

Work Experience

Senior Research BiologistMar 2019 - Present

Veridian BioSciences, Durham, NC

Designed and executed a 3-year longitudinal microbial community study across 14 wetland sites, generating a dataset of 2.4 million 16S rRNA sequences that informed EPA restoration guidelines.
Optimized metagenomic library preparation protocol, cutting reagent costs by 22% and reducing per-sample processing time from 6 hours to 3.9 hours without loss of taxonomic resolution.
Mentored 4 junior biologists and 2 graduate interns, coordinating quarterly progress reviews that improved on-time project delivery from 61% to 89% over 18 months.

Research Biologist IIAug 2015 - Feb 2019

North Carolina State University – Department of Biological Sciences, Raleigh, NC

Led a USDA-funded study on soil nitrogen-cycling bacteria in agricultural plots, producing findings adopted by 3 county extension offices to revise fertilizer application recommendations.
Built and maintained a custom QIIME2 bioinformatics pipeline that processed 800+ environmental samples per quarter with 97.4% taxonomic assignment accuracy.
Authored 5 peer-reviewed manuscripts in Environmental Microbiology and Applied and Environmental Microbiology, achieving a combined 210 citations within 3 years of publication.

Research Biologist IJun 2013 - Jul 2015

Blue Ridge Ecology Consulting, Asheville, NC

Conducted field assessments of macroinvertebrate communities at 22 stream sites for NCDOT impact mitigation studies, delivering reports 100% on schedule across a 2-year contract.
Applied multivariate statistical models in R to benthic dataset of 18,000 records, reducing data-processing time by 40% compared to prior manual methods.
Collaborated with regulatory agencies to prepare Section 404 permit documentation for 7 infrastructure projects, none of which received agency objection.

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