As FRIB scientific director, Alexandra Gade ensures that the scientific promise of FRIB is achieved by an active user community in alignment with the evolving capabilities of the facility. She convenes the FRIB Program Advisory Committee to solicit peer advice on allocation of beam time and other scientific issues and leads to realization of FRIB’s scientific vision.

Alexandra was named an MSU University Distinguished Professor in 2025. Prior to becoming FRIB Scientific Director, she served as the NSCL chief scientist from 2015 to 2022. In 2006, she joined the Michigan State University (MSU) faculty in the MSU Department of Physics and Astronomy. Alexandra joined the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL) in 2002.

Her research focuses on the structure of the atomic nucleus in the regime of very unbalanced proton and neutron numbers. Alexandra is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a fellow of the American Physical Society. She has been a member of the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee to the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation. She has served on national and international committees, including American Physical Society committees and advisory committees of the Argonne Tandem Linac Accelerator System (ATLAS) at Argonne National Laboratory, GANIL (France), TRIUMF (Canada), RIKEN Nishina Center (Japan), and GSI/FAIR (Germany). Alexandra has earned several national and international awards, including the Szymański Prize (2015), the DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator award (2008), and the Alfred Sloan fellowship (2008).