Maya Butani, Coriell Institute Science Fair Winner, Wins International First Place Award

Congratulations to Maya Butani, a winner in last year’s Coriell Institute Science Fair, for her recent first place award at the 2022 International Science and Engineering Fair! Maya received the first place award in the Biochemistry category for her work investigating the utility of plant tissue in human tissue engineering.

Maya admits she caught the science fair bug young. She first participated in the Coriell Institute Science Fair when she was in sixth grade and this international win is a bit of a repeat for Maya, but the event last May, however, was different in one big way.

“I didn’t know what I was missing because it wasn’t held in person (in 2021),” Maya said. “Meeting everyone in person is unmatched. Virtually, you can’t get the same experience meeting people around the world. At the event in Atlanta, I met people from Portugal, Egypt, Italy, and Saudi Arabia. I was able to have in-depth conversations with all these people.”

For her project, Maya utilized stem cells from connective tissue and grocery store celery. Maya sliced the celery in two ways—across the entire bunch and straight down the ribs lengthwise—to create two different surfaces to culture these stem cells. Looking down at the celery sliced across, the surface has a porous structure that is bonelike in appearance, and lengthwise, the structure is long and fibrous, like muscles.

When culturing stem cells on these two surfaces, she found that the stem cells on the porous celery sliced across were more likely to develop into bone cells and the stem cells cultured on the celery sliced lengthwise were more likely to grow into the types of cells found in muscles. Maya stained proteins and confirmed that when compared to synthetic tissue engineering bases, the stem cells responded better when cultured on the celery—there was more mechanosensing, meaning the cells had a stronger response to their physical environment.

“I found that not only is it viable to use plant material for tissue engineering, but there are advantages which is a fascinating conclusion of my research over the last four years,” Maya said.

Maya graduated last June and began attending Princeton University last fall where she is focusing her studies on Molecular Biology.

“The people I’ve met have changed my life. My mentors who have taught me and have given me opportunities, to the other science fair competitors who share my passion, and the judges who make me feel like I’m on the cutting edge of science,” Maya said. “It’s the people and the network that truly make the research.”

“ The people I’ve met have changed my life. My mentors who have taught me and have given me opportunities, to the other science fair competitors who share my passion, and the judges who make me feel like I’m on the cutting edge of science”