Amanda Labora is a General Surgery resident and current post-doctoral researcher at UCLA, where she studies nucleotide metabolism in pancreatic cancer. In pursuit of biologically relevant mouse models for her work, she developed an ultrasound-guided metastatic liver model along with an interest in leveraging design and innovation principles to address a major barrier to the translation of anti-cancer therapies: the lack of technically feasible and scalable animal models that recapitulate human disease. During residency, Amanda has endeavored to promote equity and inclusion at UCLA through her work as an executive board member of the Minority Housestaff Organization (MHO), and by developing and implementing professional development and community building initiatives for under-represented residents within the Department of Surgery. She earned her MD from the University of Pennsylvania and BA in History from Brown University. Prior to attending medical school, she completed a Fulbright fellowship in Mexico, where she how medical simulation could be used to promote respectful maternal care.