The six-week long “Students and Teachers as Research Scientists” program, sponsored by local private industries and universities, is an opportunity for high school students and teachers to participate in hands-on research, write and present research papers, and listen to lectures from nationally-known scientists. Last summer, Rebecca Liu, senior, and Stephanie Strothkamp, class of 2015, were among the select group of STARS participants. Liu worked with STARS for her second year this summer, joined by three of her classmates, Sabrina Bringham, Sydney Thomas, and Megan Wibbenmeyer, seniors.

The Roar: Can you explain your topics of research?

Sabrina Bingham: I worked [with] Salmonella. A nonprofit organization called Meds and Food for Kids works to feed malnourished children in Haiti. Right now, they are developing a snack, popcorn, and they want to use Scottish Bonnet Peppers for flavor. Scottish Bonnet Peppers are susceptible to Salmonella contamination, and their factory, located in Haiti, needs an energy efficient and cost effective way to treat the peppers for the possibility of contamination. The purpose of this study is to find a method to kill Salmonella that will work in Haiti so the Scottish Bonnet Peppers can be used to flavor popcorn. To test my hypothesis, I contaminated Scottish Bonnet Pepper samples with Salmonella and toasted them for various amount of times at different temperatures and observed the samples after diluting them and allowing them to grow overnight.

Sydney Thomas: [Megan and I] researched the pathogenesis of Parkinson’s disease. Specifically the role of the protein of alpha synuclein. In PD, it misfolds and builds up which is what forms the Lewy bodies in the brain that cause many of the trademark PD symptoms. Our lab was researching whether or not a certain dopamine metabolite (DOPAL) could increase build-up at high concentrations. Some days we would work with rats and handle them and check their weights. Other days we would spend hours working on our papers, trying to dig up new information on the pathogenesis of PD. Other times, we would stay down in the lab, running in vitro tests. So we would prepare solutions, add our protein at various concentrations and then run the assay.

The Roar: What was the biggest challenge you faced during the program?

Megan Wibbenmeyer: Me and Sydney were in the same lab. One challenge was that we worked with a spectrometer. Working with it was difficult, and some data wasn’t fully collected because of it.

SB: Near the end of the program, everybody was really tired. It was fun but it was a lot of work. I was really worried about my experiment working but it turned out to work great!

ST: The days were really long, and we had to be focussed in order to be sure everything was done precisely.

The Roar: Do you have any funny stories from your time in STARS?

SB: We just did goofy stuff like play with liquid nitrogen, and we spent a lot of time eating outside the lab.

MW: Something funny was our Bagel Tuesday’s! Bagels were seven dollars for a baker’s dozen!

ST: We would pool for bagels on Tuesday and then share with the lab and hide the extras.