Alexandra Burstell
Honor’s Program student, Neuroscience major, UMD
Contact: burstell{at}terpmail.umd.edu
Lab space: HSF3 room 9130
Alex Burstell joined our lab, commuting daily from College Park to the School of Medicine campus, to pursue her research at the fringes of neuronal cell biology. In distal axons, the unexplored wilds of the neuron, live peculiar molecular complexes that must work without instructions or support from the cell’s nucleus thousands of cell diameters away.
Alex’s project veers into analyzing the molecular constituents of these fringe complexes to help us understand how they behave to maintain healthy brain connectivity, how they misbehave to cause neurological disease, and how we can intervene to provide neuroprotection and neuroregeneration in the injured and aging brain.
Her work investigates the subcellular localization of mTOR outposts within developing neurons and the organelles or proteins that may contribute to these distant outposts. She uses mammalian cell culture, molecular cloning, CRISPR-based technologies, transfection, immunofluorescent staining, and high-resolution confocal microscopy to examine mTOR alongside structures such as Golgi satellites, lysosomes, and late endosomes. By imaging and quantifying their distribution within neuronal processes, Alex aims to identify the molecular partners that support local protein synthesis and growth far from the nucleus.
As a Senior Molecular Cellular Neuroscience Major at the University of Maryland in College Park, Alex is seeking opportunities for post-graduate research in the field of genetic and therapeutic neuroscience.
Posts featuring Alex B:
Alexandra Burstell Wins ’26 Yeger Prize!
The lab’s star honor’s undergrad, Alexandra Burstell, wins the 2026 Dr. David Yager Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Neuroscience Research!!!
This prestigious distinction is awarded annually to a rising senior Neuroscience major at the University of Maryland, College Park who has shown excellence and great promise in neuroscience research.
Alex B. joined our lab, commuting daily to the School of Medicine, to pursue her research at the fringes of neuronal cell biology. In these unexplored wilds of the neuron, live peculiar molecular complexes that must work without instructions or support from the cell’s nucleus, which lies thousands of cell diameters away.
Alex’s project pioneers the first molecular analyses that will help us understand how these unusual complexes behave to maintain healthy brain connectivity, how they misbehave to cause neurological disease, and how we can intervene to provide neuroprotection and neuroregeneration in the injured and aging brain.