Who am I?

 

I created this website as a high school sophomore in the spring of 2013, as an entry to the UC Davis Teen Biotech Challenge in which this site placed 2nd in the "Drug Discovery & Biomanufacturing" category as part of Mr. Jason Brennan's Biotech II class. It was the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM)-sponsored Creativity Program internship that I won through the competition that irrevocably changed my life.

 

In a transformational summer, I worked in the UC Davis Good Manufacturing Practice Facility with induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) reprogramming under the mentorship of Dr. Gerhard Bauer. I had no previous exposure or connections to high-level science, and I was very blessed with patient and expert teachers who built in me strong foundational laboratory skills in a strict clean-room environment. The learning curve was steep, but through hard work, determination, and most importantly persistence, I slowly scaled and overcame it. The highlight of the program was writing and presenting a research poster at a CIRM-sponsored symposium in San Francisco.

 

Blog Entries written as a part of the CIRM program circa 2013: 

1. Through their lens: Ryan Fong sees a path to success working in the lab

2. Through their lens: Ryan Fong learns the role of science and innovation in life as well as in the lab

3. #CirmStemCellLab Instagram Feed

 

I knew from this first summer that I had touched the surface of something special - something felt so right about research. With the generosity of the UC Davis Insitute for Regenerative Cures Director Dr. Jan A. Nolta, I was allowed to continue working in the lab during my junior year (2013-14) contributing to Dr. Joseph Anderson's work with a gene therapy project for HIV, evaluating genetically engineered hematopoietic stem cell transplants in mice for safety and efficacy trials.  I felt truly at home in the laboratory and in most intelligent, intimate, diverse, and truly most friendly institution that is the community of scientists. Being in the lab working on projects that had so much potential to change so many lives gave me the purpose in life I had always dreamed of finding.

 

I was also given the extraordinary honor of fourth authorship of a manuscript that has been published in the peer-reviewed journal Stem Cells.

 

Publication listing on the National Institutes of Health PubMed database here.

News article on this research here.

 

With the conclusion of this project, and with a desire to diversify my research experience and challenge myself by joining a new lab, I moved to the lab of Dwight and Vera Dunlevie Professor of Pediatric Cardiology Dr. Marlene Rabinovitch at the Vera Moulton Wall Center for Pulmonary Vascular Disease at the Stanford University School of Medicine during the summer before my senior year (2014). In the most rigorous experience of my life, I saw my developing aspirations re-affirmed as I worked with iPSC-ECs (induced pluripotent stem cells differentiated into endothelial cells) as disease models using the disease pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) under the exceptional mentorship of Dr. Silin Sa. The project was a dream opportunity for me to explore an area I was interested in for - applications of iPSCs - and for a area in which they stood to make a huge impact in changing the prognosis of lethal and debilitating cardiopulmonary diseases. Being allowed the highest degree of involvement in a project translated into incredible growth, as that first uncertain step emailing Dr. Rabinovitch and living away from home paid dividends. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On January 7, 2015  I was named a semifinalist in the Intel Science Talent Search on the research project I contributed on at Stanford as a first in school district and area history.

 

News articles:

 

1. Elk Grove Unified School District - 1/12/15

2. World Journal (Chinese language daily newspaper) - 1/12/15

3. Elk Grove Citizen (Print, 1/21/15)

4. TV News Segment (at right) CBS 13 Sacramento (1/23/15)

 

I am living proof that even the most unorthodox and unlikely background and life story can be re-written into a narrative of hope and progress. I will for life be working to pay forward these opportunities, and it has been truly a revelation to discover how many programs are out there - my mission as an officer in Sheldon High School's Biotech Academy has been to expand participation in these programs to students from my area. In this past year, in part due to outreach presentations and one on one mentoring, Sheldon boasted a record eight  students in labs at UC Davis and Stanford, the majority of whom are underprivileged or the first generation in their family to attend college. There is a documented phenonemon in education called summer learning loss (Link 1, Link 2), in which it has been found that educational disparity is created in large part because of loss of classroom learning during the summer - higher income families tend to participate in summer enrichment activities - as simple as vacations or library trips - whereas low income families do not. It is incredibly important that these summer enrichment programs be made acccessible to those young men and women who need it most.

 

This website allowed me to find a defining passion, and it is for this reason I will forever cherish the memory of its creation.

 

I will be continuing my studies as an undergraduate at Stanford University in the Fall of 2015.

                                                                                                                                     

                                                                                                                                                                 - R.