Natalie Vandepol

As the Director of the Learning Technology & Development team at the Broad College of Business, I lead a dynamic team dedicated to supporting faculty in developing innovative and impactful courses. I have been a true Spartan since 2014 when I joined MSU for my Ph.D. in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, discovering my career interest in education as a GTA in BioSci lab classes. With almost a decade of experience in educational technology and course development, I bring a wealth of knowledge and a passion for fostering academic excellence.

My core skill set includes instructional design, e-learning development, and faculty training. My expertise in project management, communication, and team leadership allows me to effectively oversee complex initiatives and drive continuous improvement within the LTD team and education at Broad College. Additionally, my strong communication and interpersonal skills enable me to build lasting relationships with faculty, college leadership, cross-campus collaborators, and other stakeholders, ensuring that their needs and goals are understood and met.

I originally joined the Broad College LTD Team in 2022 as a Learning Experience Designer (the position Matt now holds). In that role, I supported the development of numerous online master's courses, pioneered the use of innovative content development tools, and fostered collaboration across MSU to enhance educational excellence. From 2020 to 2022, I was as a postdoc in MSU IT’s Instructional Technology & Development team, where I handled Help Desk service tickets, coordinated, marketed, developed, and led virtual webinar trainings on course design and technical orientation on the full range of MSU-supported instructional tools.

I work 80% remote from my home in Asheville, North Carolina, and come to campus for a full week around 10 months each year. Outside of work, I enjoy spoiling my two cats, hiking, cooking, trying new restaurants, and spending quality time with my family and friends.

Vandepol NS, Shade A. 0. Is everything everywhere? A hands-on activity to engage undergraduates with key concepts in quantitative microbial biogeography. J Microbiol Biol Educ. 0:e00170-23.Vandepol N., Liber J, Yocca A, Matlock J, Edger P, Bonito G (2022) Linnemannia elongata (Mortierellaceae) stimulates Arabidopsis thaliana aerial growth and responses to auxin, ethylene, and reactive oxygen species. PLoS ONE 17(4): e0261908.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.026190
Vandepol, N. (2020). Mortierellaceae Phylogenomics and Tripartite Plant-Fungal-Bacterial Symbiosis of Mortierella elongata. Michigan State University - Dissertation.
https://www.proquest.com/openview/e0664b2c12c1abfe8e4b70cdf3e09a45/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=44156
Vandepol, N., Liber, J., Desirò, A., Na, H., Kennedy, M., Barry, K., ... & Bonito, G. (2020). Resolving the Mortierellaceae phylogeny through synthesis of multi-gene phylogenetics and phylogenomics. Fungal diversity, 104(1), 267-289.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13225-020-00455-5
Du, Z. Y., Zienkiewicz, K., Vandepol, N., Ostrom, N. E., Benning, C., & Bonito, G. M. (2019). Algal-fungal symbiosis leads to photosynthetic mycelium. Elife, 8, e47815.
https://elifesciences.org/articles/47815
Hejase, H. A., Vandepol, N., Bonito, G. M., & Liu, K. J. (2018, October). Fastnet: fast and accurate statistical inference of phylogenetic networks using large-scale genomic sequence data. In RECOMB International conference on Comparative Genomics (pp. 242-259). Springer, Cham.
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-00834-5_14
Hejase, H. A., Vandepol, N., Bonito, G. M., Edger, P. P., & Liu, K. J. (2017, August). Coal-Miner: a statistical method for GWA studies of quantitative traits with complex evolutionary origins. In Proceedings of the 8th ACM International Conference on Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, and Health Informatics (pp. 107-114).
https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3107411.3107490
Gdanetz, K., Benucci, G. M. N., Vandepol, N., & Bonito, G. (2017). CONSTAX: a tool for improved taxonomic resolution of environmental fungal ITS sequences. BMC bioinformatics, 18(1), 1-9.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12859-017-1952-x
Desirò, A., Rimington, W. R., Jacob, A., Vandepol, N., Smith, M. E., Trappe, J. M., ... & Bonito, G. (2017). Multigene phylogeny of Endogonales, an early diverging lineage of fungi associated with plants. IMA fungus, 8(2), 245-257.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.5598/imafungus.2017.08.02.03
Uehling, J., Gryganskyi, A., Hameed, K., Tschaplinski, T., Misztal, P. K., Wu, S., Desirò, A., Vandepol, N., ... & Bonito, G. (2017). Comparative genomics of Mortierella elongata and its bacterial endosymbiont Mycoavidus cysteinexigens. Environmental microbiology, 19(8), 2964-2983.
https://sfamjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1462-2920.13669