Alexis is a senior at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) majoring in Public Health Sciences. While at UCI, she conducted research in the Lee-Jang lab working on understanding the basics of kidney metabolism under different experimental conditions that emulate those of human diet patterns. As a visiting Amgen Scholar at UCLA, Alexis is working in Dr. Michael Teitell’s lab in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Her project in the Teitell lab consists of understanding the effect that mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) has on extracellular vesicle activity, specifically exosomes, in cancer. The lab has generated preliminary data showing a connection between mtDNA and exosome expression. However, there is no indication of how mtDNA defects may impact the progression of cancer downstream. The Teitell lab seeks to define this relationship by engineering cells with mtDNA mutations using a technique, MitoPunch, that was established internally. Once cells are engineered with the desired mutations, they can be selected for and metabolically characterized. The exosomes produced from these engineered cell lines can be isolated and their contents identified. The results obtained from the experiments conducted could allow for the development of new therapeutic agents that target exosome expression in cancer. Alexis thanks the Amgen Foundation, the UCLA Amgen Scholars Program, and the members of the Teitell lab at UCLA for their mentorship and support.