Samuel W.

My name is Samuel Whang and I’m a rising sophomore at Lakeside School. This August, it was my pleasure to be a Pathways Research Explorer. I’m grateful to have gained valuable experience in the lab and hear from real scientists that work and come from diverse fields and backgrounds. After taking biology this past school year, and from previous experiences with medicine, I wanted to further explore this field, and this program helped me do that.

From learning about the cancer hallmarks to running BRCA-1 through Gel Electrophoresis, I experienced, learned, and laughed a lot during these two weeks. Three highlights that stuck out were my peers, working in the gel labs, and Dr Abizar’s lecture on liquid biopsies.

Walking into the homeroom on Monday, it seemed impossible to imagine the group talking, let alone playing games together. The awkward silence filled the room and I soon found myself looking at the weather in Cupertino for most of the first day. However, after countless ice breakers, we quickly found ourselves willingly talking to each other and playing Among Us together. I enjoyed my peers in this program as I think that everyone’s shared passion for learning allows us to bond very quickly.

Me and Alec planning on which ingredients we would use to extract the DNA from our strawberry

The labs were another highlight of these two weeks. Starting with extracting strawberry DNA and ending on identifying patients with CML (seen below), there were many ups and downs to these labs. My lab partner Quan and I started off great, we sailed through our first micro-pipet activity of making the color wheel but our first obstacle was the gel lab. We couldn’t figure out how to get all the dye into the wells as each time we pipetted the dye it would form a bubble. At first, every attempt ended in an explosion of dye and a complete mess. But after two gel labs and many plastic tips, we found the key issue of pressing to the second stop. At this point me and Quan were thinking that maybe wet labs weren’t our thing, and we weren’t enjoying it very much, but we were determined to give it one last shot on the 3rd lab. We started the first step to make the gel itself, easy enough. Nope. We spilled the gel mixture all over the table counter. Rough start. Eventually after cutting our samples in half and working with the adjacent group we get to the hard part, pipetting. Thanks to the help from Alumni Volunteer Lac and Layan, we figured out how to mostly stop our shivering hands and fill the wells. The satisfaction from finally getting it on the final lab really just made the previous challenges all worth it.

Finally, Dr. Abizar’s lecture on liquid was the most impactful presentation due to his storytelling skills combined with his clear passion for what he does. His energy immediately caught my attention, and I enjoyed learning about his unique background. I was inspired by his background as growing up in a neighborhood in India where books were dumped outside, his environment may have not been the most encouraging. However, Abizar utilized the best parts of his surroundings, reading whatever he could to feed his curiosity. Abizar ended up getting a Ph.D and is working at the highest level of science. This illustrated to me the importance of curiosity and passion: that anyone driven enough can achieve amazing things. What made Abizar's presentation so admirable was his humility to not only teach us about liquid biopsies but inspire us to be like him.

In conclusion, these two weeks enhanced my interest and passion for science research. After many jokes, bubbles, and lectures, I find myself with invaluable experiences and memories that I will never forget.