Before their internships at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, two recent Stillwater High School graduates planned to become physicians.
Eight weeks later, they’ve added biomedical research to their career options.
Eric Wang and Shelley Lin were among 16 Sir Alexander Fleming Scholars this summer at OMRF. The program offers hands-on lab experience to incoming and current college students who attended Oklahoma high schools.
In the lab of OMRF scientist Benjamin Miller, Ph.D., Wang studied a specific cause of muscle loss. Miller chairs the foundation’s Aging & Metabolism Research Program, which seeks to increase our healthspan – the number of years we remain free of chronic disease.
“At times we had to remind ourselves that Eric was fresh out of high school,” Miller said. “His ability to grasp what we are doing in the lab is many years beyond what any of us expect for someone at his stage. The good news is that we think we got him interested in the research process, but he will excel no matter what he pursues.”
Before his OMRF internship, the incoming freshman at Oklahoma State University was interested primarily in advanced math. As part of a prior online internship, he used sophisticated algorithms to analyze historical tennis match data. The results helped him update a 2011 ESPN ranking of the greatest tennis players of all time.
Wang’s specific research at OMRF involved ribosomes, the microscopic parts of our cells that make proteins. Ribosomes deteriorate with age, leading to muscle mass decline.
His main takeaways from this summer: Quality research takes time – far more than can be accomplished in an eight-week internship – but it’s not as daunting as he feared.
Wang remains interested in a career in medicine, “but this experience has opened new possibilities. I was relieved to discover many ways to contribute to biomedical research, with opportunities to pursue the math aspect if I choose,” he said.
Lin, who will attend Johns Hopkins University this fall, interned in the lab of scientist Pengchun Yu, Ph.D., who studies malformations in our lymphatic system. These abnormalities are rare but can be life-threatening.
Yu called Lin “a very talented student” and said her internship demonstrated how insights from the lab can lead to new therapeutic strategies.
Lin’s project focused on a particular gene, PIK3CA. “The hypothesis of my project is that the mutation in PIK3CA leads to the overgrowth of lymphatics,” she said.
Lin previously interned at Stillwater Medical Center, and before her OMRF internship she planned to pursue a medical degree and eventually work in a clinic.
“Now I am considering becoming a clinician-scientist with an M.D. and a Ph.D. so that I can both treat patients and conduct research to further biomedical knowledge,” she said.
OMRF’s Fleming Scholar program, founded in 1956, has given more than 600 high school and college students from Oklahoma experience conducting biomedical research. It is named for Sir Alexander Fleming, the famed British scientist who discovered penicillin and in 1949 came to Oklahoma City to formally dedicate OMRF’s first building.
To learn more about the program, visit omrf.org/fleming.
