AHS Biochemistry Students Zoom with NASA Post-Doc Fellow

Students in Katie Kozinski's 4th period Biochemistry class recently had the opportunity to learn from one of her longtime friends, Danville High School Graduate and NASA Post-Doc Fellow Dr. Allison Fox.

During their hourlong Zoom, Dr. Fox told students about her field of specialization and her work at NASA. Dr. Fox works in the Soluble Organics in Astromaterials Division in the Johnson Space Center under Dr. Aaron Burton. She collaborates on the SHERLOC instrument onboard the Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover which is a Deep UV resonance Raman and fluorescence spectrometer capable of detecting organics and minerals present in the Martian soil.

If that sounds impressive, it is!

In the days before and after the Zoom, students read Dr. Fox's research, listed their observations, and gathered the dozens of questions they wanted to ask her:

• What's it like working with NASA?
• What parts of the rover did you work on?
• Why is it important for us to study different isotopes?
• How long did you have to go to college? What did you major in?
• What schooling, classes, previous jobs did you go through to get to NASA?
• Why is deuterium mainly found in extraterrestrial environments?
• Have we used this research to determine if there's life on other planets yet?
• What drove you to want to study this and to do this as your job?
• Why are hydrogen bonds critical for organic interactions?
• What were the most beneficial classes you took in college?

These terrestrial and extra-terrestrial questions — and many more like them — demonstrate the extent to which the interaction with Dr. Fox captured students' curiosity and helped them consider the fields of study they want to embark upon after high school as well as what careers they want to pursue.

"I cannot express how privileged I am to have Dr. Fox as a friend," said Kozinski. "She was able to start from humble beginnings to be where she is today. This is not only a huge accomplishment for a small-town midwestern student, but for all women in science."

Thanks to Mrs. Kozinski and Dr. Fox, these students will benefit from a deeper understanding of Biochemistry and a broadened perspective on where their futures could take them.