Congratulations to Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences, and the Arts (ASMSA) senior Carmella Lewis and her UAMS Biochemistry Department graduate student mentor, Ben May. Carmella won three prestigious awards for her research on the development of an assay to identify inhibitors of a protein that is a target for cancer therapy. Carmella earned first place in the Cellular and Molecular Biology division and second place overall in the West Central Regional Science and Engineering Fair, which was held at ASMSA on February 27th-28th, 2025. Carmella also qualified to compete in the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) at the West Central Regional Science Fair. ISEF is the world’s largest international STEM research competition for high school students in which nearly 2,000 finalists from more than 60 countries, regions and territories will compete in Columbus, Ohio from May 10th-16th, 2025. Carmella subsequently won second place in ISEF Finalist category at the 71st annual Arkansas State Science and Engineering Fair, which was held at the University of Central Arkansas on April 4th and 5th.
Carmella conducted her award-winning research in the laboratory of Dr. Alicia Byrd in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at UAMS. This research and training opportunity was supported by grant number P20GM121293 from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences at the National Institutes of Health and the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute at UAMS.