Seniors Shine with Recent Recognitions

Congratulations to Dana Hall seniors G. Cao ’24 and A. Fu ’24 who were recently honored for their work in science and fine arts.

Cao was named a Scholar in the Regeneron Science Talent Search 2024, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious science and math competition for high school seniors. Her research was on the pathogenic pathways of interocular pressure dependent and independent glaucoma. Cao said, “Using both genomic and transcriptomic public datasets, I found significant genes contributing to different pathways using machine learning and other algorithms on R-language. I then found potential drugs that can dysregulate these genes and tested their binding on the chemicals using molecular docking.”

The 300 scholars hail from 196 American and international high schools in 36 states and China. They were chosen based on their outstanding research, leadership skills, community involvement, commitment to academics, creativity in asking scientific questions and demonstration of exceptional promise as leaders in STEM fields.

Fu’s work, “Looking Back,” was chosen for the Emerging Young Artists and Designers 2024 Juried Exhibition at UMass Dartmouth’s College of Visual and Performing Arts (CVPA). Her piece was also chosen for the exhibition’s poster.

“The piece shows two children from rural China, one focused on peeling an egg, the other gazing into the distance,” Fu said. “Due to the lack of education and technology in their region, they don’t know what the world outside of their village is like, shown by the newspaper enclosing them. However, with more volunteers going to rural China to educate children, their view of the world can be broadened, suggested by the sky peeking through the paper. I chose to submit this piece because it was one that I am proud of and spent a lot of time on.”

Emerging Young Artists and Designers is a highly competitive online juried exhibition, which celebrates the exceptional artistic merit of New England’s high school students. EYAD 2024 received submissions from more than 800 young artists, from which the juror, CVPA’s Associate Dean Ann Kim, selected 200 works for the exhibition. The exhibition opened on January 26.