Wootton High School Interns "Graduate" from
CARB Program

Baltimore, MD - Six Wootton High School seniors today completed a year-long science internship at UMBI's Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology (CARB) at Shady Grove. Students performed biotechnology lab work such as analyzing proteins on polyacrylamide gels, growing crystals of proteins, devising biological assays, cloning genes for important enzymes, studying protein structures, expressing and purifying proteins, and using computational chemistry and modeling techniques to study single nucleotide polymorphisms. During the 2004 summer, each student worked forty hours a week for eight weeks in a CARB laboratory. During the school year they continued their studies by spending an additional 10-15 hours per week in the CARB labs throughout the school year.

Students not only contributed to the work of each of the labs, they also learned valuable lessons through both scientific failures and successes. At the end of the semester, students were asked to present their findings at a special symposium attended by their teachers and members of the Montgomery County Public School system, family members, CARB staff, and fellow students. Pictured are these exceptional Wootton High School seniors and their mentors at CARB.

From left to right are: Ms. Leslie Adler, science internship coordinator and Director of the Molecular Biology Resource at Wootton High School; Dr. Ed Eisenstein, Director of the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology; Katherine Shi (student intern) and her mentor, Dr. Jim Parsons; Maleeha Bader (student) and Dr. Jane Ladner (mentor); Florence Lin (student) and Dr. John Orban (mentor); Dr. Victoria Doseeva (mentor) and Connie Cheng (student); Arjun Krishnakumar (student, back row) and his mentor Eugene Melamud filling in for Dr. John Moult; and Dr. Zvi Kelman (mentor) with his student intern Mimi Han.

These seniors will now go on to colleges across the US, including the University of Michigan, NYU, University of Virginia, and UMBC. Many students will maintain connections with their laboratory mentors at CARB for years to come.

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Celebrating our 20th anniversary year, UMBI is the first and only biotechnology research institute within the University System of Maryland and was established in 1985. The University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute (UMBI) consists of five major research and education centers and is dedicated to advancing the frontiers of biotechnology. UMBI’s centers of research include: CARB, the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology located in Rockville; CBR, the Center for Biosystems Research located in College Park; and COMB, the Center of Marine Biotechnology, MBC, the Medical Biotechnology Center, and IHV, the Institute of Human Virology, all located in Baltimore. For more information, visit www.umbi.umd.edu