Not only is senior Sara Bahri a star volleyball and basketball player, she is also the latest shining star of the research program. The Society for Science & the Public and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals were proud to announce that Bahri was one of the top 300 students in the Regeneron Science Talent Search for 2020. She was one of 36 Long Island high school students to be named semi-finalists, earning $2,000 for her and the school through her research project entitled “Altered Bilayer Elasticity a as a Novel Mechanism for Aminoglycoside Antibiotics’ Toxicity.” 

     Known as the nation’s oldest and most prestigious STEM competition, students submit their developing research that could solve challenging problems in their field of study. Each year, 300 scholars are selected from the 1,900 students from almost 600 high schools in hope of competing in the semi-finals of the competition. With each student entering his/her own original idea, the Regeneron STS looks for inspiring, committed, and exceptional young scientists among the nation’s high schools to reward the honor. 

About her project, Bahri explained that an effective antibiotic known as Aminoglycoside is known to produce toxic side effects in the ears and kidneys. Furthermore, the elasticity of a cell membrane can be affected, even altering its ability to bend and compress. Using prior background knowledge on the cell membrane’s toxicity level and elasticity, she developed a novel approach to quantifying toxicity by constructing an artificial cell membrane and exposing it to aminoglycosides to examine effects.  

To complete her project, Bahri submerged herself unto long hours of research. She spent her summer at Weill Cornell Medical College’s Anderson Lab of Physiology and Biophysics to carry out her research for the experiment.  

Following last year’s Regeneron competition, where last year’s seniors Kaylie Hausknecht and Juliana Condoleo were both considered as Regeneron semi-finalists, Bahri marks the second year in a row that the Lynbrook Science Research Program has had at least one student earn the Regeneron scholar title. She is now on her way to possibly being named one of the 40 finalists in the competition. Finalists receive a trip to Washington, D.C., where they will compete for more than $1.8 million in awards by Regeneron. On January 22, Bahri learned she did not make it to the finals; however, earning the honor of being in the semi-finalists is already an astounding achievement.

Charles Vessalico, Bahri’s research teacher for her sophomore and junior year, shared his excitement about her prestigious achievement: “I am incredibly proud of her. I can now say without a doubt that Sara is truly a ‘Scholar Athlete’ and a model student for all Lynbrook to look up to, literally and figuratively!” 

“For me, there’s a personal satisfaction in knowing that something that I developed many years ago is still successful and is still producing scientists,” said Lynbrook Research teacher David Shanker, Bahri’s current mentor. As well as being credited for creating  the Research Program here at LHS in 1999, Shanker has progressively worked hard to help students strive high to compete at a national level. 

“I feel so grateful to be a part of Lynbrook’s encouraging community and, of course, a member of this growing science research program,” Bahri explained. “It’s amazing to see how far we’ve come,” she added. This appears to be only the beginning of Bahri’s research endeavors.