My research interests lie in applying the fundamental goals of science --- to observe, explain, and verify --- to the connections between fundamental physics and the universe. As such, I have focused my efforts in two broad directions: interpreting the puzzles suggested by cosmological and astrophysical datasets in terms of new theoretical constructions; and developing our understanding of fundamental theory in ways that allows us to make rigorous predictions for upcoming cosmological missions. These dual goals guide my work both on phenomenological models in particle cosmology that are closely driven by the data, and also on formal field theory research that extends our understandings of gravity and particle physics.