PRIMES: John Long's Story

I primarily became interested in math because of math competitions. Through these competitions, I learned many tricks, but later on, I would build a firm foundation of the principles behind the tricks. I was also quite interested in computer science but did not have as much experience with computer science outside of programming simple apps and games. Because I wanted to learn more about the field of computer science and what computer science research was like, I decided to apply to the computer science track.

Currently at PRIMES, I am working on a project in computational biology. From my short time at PRIMES so far, I have gotten a chance to delve into the field. My mentor was very helpful in explaining to me the background and previous research. I knew little about purifying selection, genomic regions, the Unix command line, and scripting languages, but with the help of my mentor, I was able to learn all of these quickly and painlessly. Understanding where my project fit in with the rest of the research also gave me a greater appreciation for my project, and the material was interesting in its own right.

I would highly recommend applying to PRIMES if you are a high school student interested in mathematics or computer science. At PRIMES, you will get to interact with mentors and fellow students who are passionate about mathematics and computer science.

John Long worked on the project Evidence of purifying selection in humans under the mentorship of Angela Yen.

Email us: primes@math.mit.edu