2025 National Scholar Award for the SURF Grant

Author: Bailey Scoggins | Major: Biochemistry | Semester: Spring 2025 |

Hey there! I’m Bailey Scoggins, a first-generation graduate from Lepanto, Arkansas. I completed a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry with minors in Spanish, criminal justice, and biology. I completed my honors research project under the direction of Dr. Julie Stenken in the Chemistry and Biochemistry department in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences during the Fall 2024 and Spring 2025 semesters. In the future, I want to continue my education through graduate studies after gaining some experience in the professional industry to further hone my skills and assess the area of study that is best fit for me.

My work focused on microdialysis devices and characterizing a 3D printed prototype for its membrane performance and non-specific adsorption of enzymes to its surface. Microdialysis is a sampling technique that has important applications in the fields of neuroscience and pharmacokinetic studies to analyze the concentrations of small molecules in real-time within biological systems. They utilize small probes that are difficult to customize and adapt when commercially made. Previous work by other members in my lab has focused on designing and fabricating a unique 3D printed version of these devices to overcome the given challenges of standard microdialysis devices. The future goal is to replace “off-the-shelf” devices with the 3D printed ones. My work in characterization has given valuable background information to help forward that plan in optimizing their design, which was a rewarding endeavor that I am very glad to have been a part of.

When I was tasked with finding a research mentor, I started by reviewing the potential professors in my department from the directory online. I looked through each of their backgrounds and previous publications, as well as any information on what previous undergraduate students had worked on in their lab. I got valuable insights into what type of work the lab focused on and if it would be a good fit for me. Another consideration I made was if I had taken any classes with these professors. It was important to me that my mentor already had an idea of my skills, abilities, and how I perform in the classroom. I believed it would make the professor more likely to accept me into their lab and trust me with the self-directed nature of a research project, which led me to Dr. Julie Stenken. In the early days of joining the lab, I had several conversations with her and Dr. Patrick Pysz to choose a topic that was relevant and appealing. After all, I would spend an entire school year researching, conducting experiments, and writing about this topic. The design of the 3D printed microdialysis probe had recently been published, so the next phase was to characterize them and build on that work. We landed on that project because it drew on previous research within the lab, while also allowing me to learn a lot about the principles of microdialysis and critical lab skills that are applicable down the line.

Having a challenging and interesting topic was important because it taught me valuable research skills that only improved as I continued my journey. Primarily, I learned what microdialysis is. I was unaware of how it works, its importance in research, and surprisingly, how different it is from standard dialysis. It wasn’t necessarily new for me to find and read research articles, analyze and interpret data, write up my results, or present information, thanks to my prior research experience and other science-based coursework. However, the experiments did pose a new challenge for me. It wasn’t necessarily conducting experiments, but more so designing them. Typical teaching labs give you a procedure to follow. Original research may have prior work to draw on, but there’s not always a standard practice that works with your topic. Dr. Stenken was a big help in deciding what experiments to do, but I primarily decided how to do them. There was a lot of trial and error, and I failed A LOT. I am a firm believer in failure, however. While I felt like giving up at times, I was able to push through and get more out of the experience than if I were handed a set procedure to follow without coming up with anything new.

            While a lot of my work was self-directed, Dr. Stenken was a huge help throughout the entire process. She was greatly involved in the process of applying for my SURF grant. She provided me with a recommendation letter to the review board and helped review and edit my proposal document to polish and refine it. I was eventually able to use that structure and writing and completing my honors thesis paper and research, which she also helped to review. We also worked together to create timelines and schedule practice presentations to prepare me for the final defense to wrap up this work. Other members of the lab helped as well, namely Olivia Enietan and Patrick Pysz. They helped guide me through the ins and outs of working in the research lab and were there when I was stuck with something. At times, it felt like I was all alone, but I never really was. I always had someone to go to when I needed assistance, and this work wouldn’t be complete without them.

For now, I have accepted a position as a lab technician at a startup medical laboratory in Rogers, Arkansas. I will be performing DNA extraction and PCR analysis on medical samples from patients to aid in diagnosis medical conditions for several clinics in the area. I plan to eventually move out of state to pursue a graduate degree, but for now, I want to take some time away from academics and focus on furthering my professional experience. I’m so grateful for the opportunities that this work and funding has provided me because the outcomes of my post grad life would’ve been very different.