Amanda Buchberger, a third year chemistry graduate student in the laboratory of Lingjun Li, professor of pharmaceutical sciences and chemistry, has earned an NIH NRSA F31 Fellowship. Buchberger completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. The fellowship focuses on using crustaceans as a model organism to study neuropeptides and how they change due to hypoxia. This project will improve our understanding on the biochemical changes enacted by hypoxia on the nervous system, both in acute and long-term exposure. These changes in the crustacean model organisms will help us to identify similar signaling molecules that may play a role in adaptation to hypoxia in mammals. By gaining further knowledge in basic neurobiology and neurochemistry, society will have a better understanding of the brain and how its neurobiology changes in medical conditions where hypoxia occurs, including respiratory distress, cancer, asthma, etc.