A 17-year-old high school student from Iowa City has developed a surgical tool that has the ability to detect infection.
Dasia Taylor is a senior at Iowa City West High School. She was recently named a Regeneron Science Talent Scholar after developing a concept so simple it's shocking no one had thought of it before. Taylor invented color-changing sutures that are able detect infection, The Gazette reports.
Taylor was named among the top 300 scholars this year out of 1,760 students.
"Even if you don’t know what you’re doing, just go with it,” Taylor told reporters. “I stand by the idea that I stumbled into STEM by way of intellectual curiosity. Be curious, because that will afford you so many opportunities."
After a year of trial and error, learning the sterile field, and even how to properly put on surgical gloves, Taylor entered her project into the Junior Science and Humanities Symposium in March 2020, she says she fast realized she was the only Black student present.
"Being in the room knowing stereotypes were flying and to be able to prove them wrong and win first place was phenomenal. My mom and I talk about it all the time. I often find myself in white-dominated spaces. That's definitely one for the books," Taylor told the Gazette.
This is not Taylor's only achievement. She's involved in numerous committees in Iowa City and according to the Daily Iowa, she recently gave a presentation at Harvard on racial equity.
Today, Taylor is on track to being named one of 40 finalists who will receive $25,000 and participate in the final competition in March for the grand prize of $250,000.
Taylor tells The Gazette she hopes that someday her invention can be in developing countries to fight infection and save lives.