TNJSF JEI Award Winner: Jacob Winick

Jacob Winick recently graduated from Millburn High School. His project was on two types of blood cancer, myelodysplastic syndrome and acute myeloid leukemia, that have limited treatment options. Jacob looked at neoantigens, proteins that form on cancer cells from genetic mutations present in those cells, resulting from mutations in ZRSR2. He was able to find two neoantigens that provide various opportunities for precision therapeutics for blood cancers.

During his research Jacob noted how the sensitivity of tests used (and available) can be a major limiting factor in what you are able to accomplish. In addition, he said “research is not just about making discoveries but also making new tools to help researchers make those discoveries.” Jacob also noted that the impact of participating and presenting at TNJSF was multifaceted. First, it allowed him to work on his presentation skills on a complex topic. Second, it showed him just how important connecting with your audience is to share your work with them. Lastly, he noted how learning how to speak about higher-level work to a general audience is important as a general audience often has a limited understanding of the background knowledge that sets the importance of the research question being studied.

Congrats to Jacob and his success at TNJSF - we can’t wait to see what he does next!

The material on this page was prepared by Kari Mattison, JEI co-Editor in Chief. Jacob Winick provided the photo and answers to standard questions which was edited lightly for clarity.