Galen O’Shea-Stone, PhD

Postdoctoral Research Associate, Rashid Lab
Department of Microbiology & Cell Biology, Montana State University

Using transcriptomics, imaging, and evolutionary-developmental biology to uncover how inflammation sculpts skeletal form.

About Me:

I am a biochemical data scientist turned evolutionary-developmental biologist. After earning my PhD in Biochemistry—where I built NMR‐based pipelines for wildlife and translational studies—I joined Dr. Dana Rashid’s lab to explore how sterile inflammation guides bone growth and fusion during vertebrate development. 

Our group recently secured a W.M. Keck Foundation award to map inflammation-driven skeletogenesis across birds and mammals.

My day-to-day work combines:

• Whole-tissue transcriptomics of mouse fracture and avian tail-bud models

• High-resolution imaging (µCT & confocal) to couple gene expression with 3-D bone morphology

• Integrative analytics—merging RNA, imaging, and histological data in reproducible R/Python workflows

• Open-source tooling: custom pipelines for DESeq2, limma-voom, scRNA-seq QC, and interactive visualizations

I thrive on cross-disciplinary collaboration, transparent code, and mentoring emerging scientists in quantitative methods.

Research Interests

1. Inflammation-mediated skeletal morphogenesis

2. Evolutionary origins of bone fusion in avian and dinosaur lineages

3. Biomarkers of tissue regeneration and nutritional stress

4. Statistical & machine-learning methods for high-dimensional biological data

Selected Research: 

Polar Metabolite Profiles Distinguish Between Early and Severe Sub-Maintenance Nutritional States of Wild Bighorn Sheep

1H NMR based metabolic profiling distinguishes the differential impact of capture techniques on wild bighorn sheep 

Distinct Metabolic States Are Observed in Hypoglycemia Induced in Mice by Ricin Toxin or by Fasting 

18β-Glycyrrhetinic Acid Induces Metabolic Changes and Reduces Staphylococcus aureus Bacterial Cell-to-Cell Interactions 

Copper deficiency is an independent risk factor for mortality in patients with advanced liver disease

Site last updated: June 2025