Two factors drive Jeremy Kosir’s ambitions: curiosity and a desire to help others.
At Ohio Northern University, Jeremy is majoring in biochemistry and molecular biology with plans to become a research oncologist.
“I’ve been given a ‘big, curious brain’ as my mom likes to say,” he says. “And if I can do research while helping those that need it most, I would lead the perfect life.”
Outside of the classroom, Jeremy works as an EMT in Ada, where he’s grown in confidence in dealing with emergencies and working as part of a medical team to assist patients.
He’s also working in a research lab with Dr. Chris Spiese on a computational project involving data from NASA’s Cassini, a sophisticated robotic spacecraft sent to study Saturn and its complex system of rings and moons. The project involves looking for specific sulfur compounds in dust collisions observed by Cassini.
Having previous experience with coding, Jeremy was eager to get involved with the project since it was the perfect opportunity to strengthen his data mining skills. As a result, he has learned new skills in Python coding.
“What I find most enjoyable about my project is that I have the creative liberty to analyze data and fix problems any way I want,” he says. “Dr. Spiese and I had a general plan on what I was going to try and accomplish, but other than that I had free reign to problem solve myself.”
In addition, the research experience has ignited Jeremy’s passion for learning, problem-solving, and scrutinizing details at every turn. Since he’s considering a future career in medicine, he knows that setting a high bar for himself now will only help him in the long run.
“There is so much nuance to science and medicine; learning the ability to pick apart large problems into little wins step by step sets me up perfectly to be the best physician-scientist I can be,” he says.