Herricks High School senior Neil Pathak is going to back Los Angeles this year, and fellow senior Shaym Venkateswaran is going with him as they represent the school’s science research program at the Intel International Science Fair in early May.
And there’s a good chance they’ll get to visit Universal Pictures Studios in between making research presentations and listening to Novel laureates on panels at the science fair.
The two seniors are among 24 Long Island students selected to go to the prestigious annual international competition from May 7 through May 14.
For Pathak, who presented a project at the Intel science fair in Los Angeles last year, it’s definitely not old hat.
“I think it’s great. It’s really a phenomenal experience,” Pathak said. “It’s very humbling.”
Pathak found himself listening to a panel of Nobel laureates and even asking one of them, a Harvard chemistry professor, a question. He doesn’t remember the professor’s name.
This year Pathak has a very specific objective. He wants to gain more information from representatives of scientists from pharmaceutical companies about practical aspects of implementing his project idea – to develop a daily regimen of radiation and chemotherapy using an injected chemical cocktail that selectively attacks cancer cells. The dual therapy, Pathak said, is “more potent than conventional therapies.”
And he knows that pharmaceutical companies are also cruising the science fair for bright young students with practicable ideas for new approaches to existing problems. So he wants to speak to pharmaceutical scientists to discuss the potential for the drug-delivery system he conceived “for going to the next step.”
Those companies also present special awards to deserving young scholars, but just being there is the whole point as far as Pathak’s concerned.
“Just talking to them is the most satisfying part of this,” he said, “gaining insight to what will work.”
Both students developed their projects with research scientist mentors at Stony Brook University Laboratories over the past two years.
Two summers ago, Venkateswaran did research on cell culturing in a test on an environmental carcinogen. More recently, he has addressed engineering a biomaterial to fill a body cavity after surgery, a biomaterial that would biodegrade as it receded to enable healthy body cells to regrow and fill the cavity.
“It shows great promise in driving regeneration,” Venkateswaran said of the bio-gell made of what he called “a completely new polymer” called Pluronic F87. He became acquainted with the polymer as a research assistant at Stony Brook.
The material would be an interim solution for a patient who has undergone a lumpectomy on a breast. Venkateswaran said there are currently “no materials available today to enable restoration of the body.”
Pathak’s parents are both physicians and he said he intends to do something in the medical and research fields. Venkateswaran said he wants to become either a surgeon or an anesthesiologist.
Venkateswaran said going to Intel World, as it’s known, is “something I’ve aspired to do and to meet so many people from around the globe and see the research being done today.”
The two young science scholars were among 11 Herricks High students who came through the first round of the Long Island Science and Engineering Fair. They had all prepared papers and delivered 12-minute presentations to a team of three scientists judging the competition.
“The toughest part is being able to defend your project when it’s being poked at by professional scientists,” Venkateswaran said.
Pathak agreed that was the “most daunting” part of the competition and said the scientists’ questions were “challenging.”
Both students will reprise their presentations in Los Angeles in May, with the potential of placing among the top four students in their respective disciplines.
Since Pathak’s project is in chemistry and Venkateswaran’s project is in engineering, they’re not competing against each other
Pathak’s project is an amplified version of the project that made him a semifinalist in the Intel Talent Search competition earlier this year. Venkateswaran’s project is on the practical use of that biodegradable filler as a transitional material to permanent healing.
He said he’s excited at the thought of talking to “real scientists” about his project and other scientific subjects in Los Angeles.
The two students are the latest in a long line of Herricks science scholars who’ve made the Intel International stage, according to Renee Barcia, director of the Herricks science research program.
Barcia calls the Intel fair “the Olympics of science research” and a rare opportunity for two young medically-minded Herricks students to converse with scientist pros and like-minded peers as they put their projects on the line once more.
This time they may be facing judging panels that include Nobel laureates, which figures to be a rigorous audience.
But that’s part of the challenge for the young scientists.
And there is that chance, according to Barcia, that they’ll all be able to relax with a behind-the-scenes tour of other creators’ ideas on the Universal Pictures Studio tour.
