Alexis Harold

Alexis graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in Spring 2020 with a B.S. in Biological Sciences. During her undergraduate career, she worked in the lab of Dr. Masahiro Shuda primarily studying the mechanism in which Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCV)-associated human Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) can revert to an untransformed state and acquire a differentiated neuron-like phenotype through the viral activation of Sox2. Additionally, in 2019 she participated in the Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship- Graduation Education program at the University of Cincinnati in the lab of Dr. Jun-Lin Guan studying the role of autophagy in breast cancer.

Alexis joined the University of Michigan in 2020 as a rotating graduate student in the Program for Biomedical Sciences (PIBS). In the spring of 2021 she joined the lab of Professor Goutham Narla at the Rogel Cancer Center to complete her thesis work.

Outside of the lab, Alexis enjoys running, yoga, and binge-watching tv!

Alexis is interested in how the tumor suppressor protein phosphatase 2A (PP2A) regulates ER expression, activity, and signaling in ER-positive breast cancer. Additionally, she seeks to therapeutically reactivate this phosphatase using a series of novel small molecule PP2A modulators to study the effects of negatively regulating ER expression and signaling in disease relevant cellular and in vivo model systems. Additionally, she is conducting a project with the Kitzman lab at the University of Michigan to understand the mutational landscape of the alpha subunit of PP2A.

Proteogenomics in Cancer Training Program T32 (2021-2023)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/alexis.harold.2/bibliography/public/