Faith Chang and Diane Choi have each been named Semi-Finalists in the prestigious Intel Science Talent Competition, earning recognition among the most talented research students in the country. Earlier this year, Faith Chang was also named as a Semi-Finalist in the 2005-2006 Siemens-Westinghouse Competition for her project, which entails new research in breast cancer research.

What made the achievement even more special, said Chang, is that she and Choi are best friends. "Diane was told she made Semi-Finalist by her project advisor, Ms. Eager, and then they called Mrs. Luk (Research Program Facilitator Angela Lukaszewski) and she told Diane that I won also. It was so great to learn the news from Diane and share the excitement with her," said Chang.

As a Semifinalist in the 2005-06 Siemens-Westinghouse Competition Chang is the first Syosset High School student to achieve recognition in both contests. Chang studied a tumor suppressor gene called DBC2, which is capable of killing certain breast cancer cells. Her research involved tagging and tracking the gene with a live cell confocal laser-scanning microscope under the direction of Dr. Masaaki Hamaguchi, her mentor at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Chang's goal was to discover the role that particular gene played in the transportation of protein to cells. Her findings showed that DBC2 does play a role in the protein transport that is worthy of further investigation. She is continuing her work in this research now and plans to stay with this project while in college next year.

Diane Choi conducted a social science survey in the area of Japanese culture. She decided to conduct her own research after she read the work of Japanese author Takeo Doi, who espoused that the Japanese cultivated the relationship behavior called amae, and that people of other cultures would not emulate this behavior. By developing a series of questions that could be interpreted as a measurement of whether an individual would demonstrate amae in a specific situation, Choi confirmed that there are definite differences in the ways that Japanese and American adults predicted they would respond. Understanding how culture affects behavior is an important issue for social behaviorists.

Superintendent of Schools Dr. Carole G. Hankin congratulated the young women on their accomplishments. "Syosset Schools share in the pride of these two young women's success. We are very fortunate to be able to provide the program that gives such talented and hard working students the opportunity to realize their full potentials. Syosset's Research Program has the strong support it needs of the board of education, administration, and entire school community."

Samuel Lee and Alexis Rosenblum, both seniors at Jericho High School, were recently named two of the three hundred Semifinalists in the 65th Intel Science Talent Search. They were chosen from among 1558 entrants representing 486 high schools in 44 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and an overseas school. Semifinalists and their schools receive matching awards of $1,000. From this group of 300 semifinalists, 40 finalists will be chosen to attend the Science Talent Institute in Washington, D.C. from March 9-14. During their trip to Washington, the finalists will participate in a final judging process and share in $530,000 in scholarships. The top prize of a $100,000 scholarship will be announced at an awards ceremony on March 14, 2006.

Samuel Lee earned a semifinalist spot with his project: Introducing STAT 3-C into Non-Tumorigenic Prostate Epithelial Cells. Stat3 is a protein that is present in a number of different cancer cells including breast, head and neck, and prostate cancer. Stat3 is known to be malignant only when persistently activated. "In this project, Stat3-C, an artificially created form of this continuously activated Stat3, was used to infect healthy, non-tumorigenic prostate cells," explained Lee. "It was found that doing so emulated the functions and responses of a cancerous cell. Furthermore, specific genes in the cells that the Stat3-C targeted were isolated, observed for any changes, and then manipulated. Potentially, this research can lead to cancer treatment that is highly gene specific." Samuel is a student in the Independent Research Program with teacher Chris Hoeppner.

Alexis Rosenblum's project is entitled: The Effect of Variation in Instrument Pitch on Gender Associations among 2nd Graders: An Empirical Analysis. "I believe that children who had never been exposed to instruments in school or who had little knowledge of instruments would not only associate higher pitched instruments with more feminine characteristics than lower pitched ones but that they would also make gender associations with high and low pitches of the same instrument," said Rosenblum. "The purpose of my study is not only to correct the methodological flaws in the Elliot & Yoder-White study but also to determine if elementary level students make gender associations with instruments based on pitch." Alexis is a student in the Independent Social Science Research Program with teacher Anthony Scarnati.