Wayzata Student Searches for a Cure

Ever heard of CD24? It's not the latest rock band or a better way to invest your money.

CD24 is a human gene.

It is also the foundation of Wayzata High School junior Evan Chen's award-winning research project, and, more importantly, a hope to thousands of people suffering from muscular dystrophy disease. Chen said those patients are where his inspiration comes from.

“There were three boys from Taiwan who had adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD) and needed a bone marrow transplant,” he said. “I befriended them and learned about the stem cell treatment that they needed. That's how I initially became interested in stem cells—I had a real life encounter with someone who actually needed stem cell therapy.”

A fellow Wayzata classmate diagnosed with muscular dystrophy disease also motivated Chen.

“Knowing that there is someone in my vicinity that can benefit from some of the research that I'm doing is really inspirational,” he said

According to Chen, the muscle cells of a patient diagnosed with muscular dystrophy don't regenerate or “repair” themselves fast enough after the natural “damage” caused by normal body activity. Death can occur early from internal organ failure or respiratory issues.

Chen explained his research to Patch.

“I wanted to introduce a new gene, CD24, through gene therapy, and introduce that into the muscle cell itself to produce artificially faster differentiation and greater differentiation, so I can repair this muscle in the long term and, therefore, prevent the symptoms that we normally see in muscular dystrophy patients,” Chen said.

A research project like this can take 20 to 30 years to see fruition, but Chen said that he'd “gotten far enough in the stages to conclude that there is a correlation or causational relationship between the gene CD24 and faster muscular regeneration.”

The SciMent Science Research program—offered through Intermediate School District 287—provides high school students like Chen with the opportunity to perform graduate level research. SciMent advisor, Princesa VanBuren Hansen, worked with Chen and explained the level of commitment and academic know-how required to be successful in competition.

“Students must be passionate about their work, dedicating significant amounts of time to their research,” she said. “But, more than that, they also have to demonstrate creative thought, initiative and ownership of their work.”

Chen believes that science, specifically biotechnology, will play an important role in our future.

“Science is sort of the cutting edge of our society – its the best representation of our progress moving to the future,” he explained. “I think that biotechnology will be increasingly important in how we treat patients, how we help others and how we solve a lot of the problems such as diseases or infections.”

VanBuren Hansen says Chen will be part of that progress.

“Evan is an exceptional student and scientist,” she said. “I trust that we will see great accomplishment from Evan in the future, and I look forward to seeing where his journey takes him.”

In order to win awards at the national and international level, VanBuren Hansen said that students like Chen “must have strong data, results and conclusions” and “must be able to present their work in a very comprehensible way, explain its relevance to real-life situations and make that presentation of their work visually appealing.”

Chen's project, “CD24 Induced Muscular Regeneration: Unraveling the mystery behind Satellite Cell Differentiation,” earned several awards at the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) this past May. They are listed below:

•  Third place Grand Award at ISEF in the Cellular and Molecular Biology Category and $,1000 scholarship.
• Air Force Research Laboratory on behalf of the United States Air Force First Place Award and $3000 scholarship.
• American Intellectual Property Law Association Second Place Award and $250 scholarship.

Chen's work also placed in the top-six in the Life Sciences category at the National Junior Science and Humanities Symposium in San Diego. As the BioGENEius Challenge award winner, Chen will advance to the U.S. National BioGENEius Challenge in Washington, D.C. on June 25.