Rachel Bandler

I grew up in Fairfield, Connecticut, and am the oldest of three siblings.I attended MIT for college, where I majored in Chemistry and minored in Biology and Political Science. At MIT, I was an undergraduate researcher in Ed Boyden’s lab and used optogenetics approaches to silence epileptic seizures. I then joined the MD/PhD program at NYU, where I completed my thesis work in GordFishell’slab, using single-cell genomics and lineage tracing approaches to study cortical interneuron development. After my first medical school rotation on an inpatient psychiatry unit at Bellevue Hospital, I knew psychiatry was the specialty for me. Going forward, I hope to apply basic neuroscience research tools to better understand, and eventually treat, neuropsychiatric illnesses. I am particularly interested in disorders with a developmental origin, including autism and schizophrenia. I am so excited to move back to Connecticut to join the NRTP at Yale for residency, where I plan to continue my research on fetal brain development. For fun, I love to paint, go to Broadway shows, visit art museums, and play tennis and board games with friends and family.