Rina Yan

Rina Yan

Rina Yan

Residency: Nantou, Taiwan
School: Putai Senior High School
Intended Major: Business and Biology
Age: Grade 10

Rina aspires to get into NYU and BU. She is currently at the stage of exploration, having interest in both Business and Biology, she is also a member of a Robotics Club at school. She ranks top 5% in class, and although her weakness is in English, that never stopped her from achieving more.


What challenges did she face?

  • At the exploration stage, Rina somewhat struggled to find a specific research area and topic to work on.
  • Rina met with some problems in the longevity research topic and needed guidance on dissecting components of a scientific paper.


Matched professor:

The professor is a research assistant professor at Tufts University and previously a postdoctoral researcher at Columbia University. For his research work, he was awarded Forbes 30 Under 30 in Science.


How did our program help her?

  • The program has allowed Rina to be exposed to both academic and industry-side research as a possible future career or interest. 
  • With guidance from the professor, Rina pursued a novel research area in the subfield of biology in longevity research. She was further led to understanding cultural and ethical issues surrounding advanced biological research, which is less talked about at her level.


Below is part of an example work done during the program:

Program goals and objectives outlined by Dr. Hoel in the mid-point and final evaluation forms
The professor constantly provided relevant external resources to help Rina on her research paper
Some of the homework given was to listen and engage with relevant podcast and to list down any questions for the professor in the following session
The professor has expressed he will recommend Rina to selective universities when she is at the stage of application.
A follow-up email from Rina to the professor after 2 months. Rina has expressed her gratitude towards Dr. Hoel for inspiring her, and with a deepened interest after the program, she has now gone on to another internship in the filed of Biology.
An excerpt of the Final Research Paper from Rina on a novel biology research topic of longevity. The paper further touched on the theory of Calorie Restriction, NAD Level, and Blood Plasma Rejuvenation.
Rina has learnt about the different components of writing a research paper, such as reviewing past literatures, using a narrative hook in the introduction, using secondary data to support her arguments, building references and more.

Leave a Reply