TGen student interns win national math and science competition
Summary:
Two Valley high school students garnered the top prize at the Siemens Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science, and Technology. The two TGen interns will split the $100,000 prize.
Full Story:
Two Valley high school students garnered the top prize at the Siemens Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science, and Technology.
Anne Lee, a senior at Phoenix Country Day School, and Albert Shieh, a junior at Chaparral High School, were awarded the $100,000 mathematics and science team research award for improving software to more accurately analyzes genetic data.
Lee and Shieh, who worked on the project as interns of TGen's summer program, are Arizona's first recipients of the prestigious award. TGen now uses the software.
The Siemens Westinghouse Competition was launched in 1998 to recognize America's best and brightest students in math, science, and technology. This year, 1,684 students entered the competition, a 13 percent increase over the previous year.
Lee and Shieh developed their project, titled "SNiPer: Improved SNP Genotype Calling for Affymetrix 10K GenoChip Microarray Data," under the mentorship of TGen's Dietrich Stephan, David Craig, and Matt Huentelman. With the improved software, the students were able to pinpoint a mutated gene that causes a childhood degenerative disorder.
"Anne and Albert's software tools will positively impact investigators worldwide," Huentelman said. "We could not be happier to see these young researchers win this prestigious competition."
Lee and Shieh's research was published in the October 31, 2005 issue of the genetics journal, BMC Genomics.
This was not the first publication for either student. Lee's research on the causes of Salla disease, a neurological disorder, was published in the American Journal of Medical Genetics. Shieh's work examining the genetic code to find disease-causing mutations earned him the honor of being the first author on another paper published in the BMC Genomics journal.
For more information:
"TGen work wins Valley students scholarship cash," Arizona Republic, 12/06/2005
"TGen interns take first place in prestigious science competition," TGen press release, 12/05/2005
"Homeschooled boy wins national science contest," CNN, 12/05/2005