Aging is an incurable disease, at least according to senior Annika Lillegard. The accumulation of cellular and molecular damage, or aging, is often overlooked because it is a fundamental obstacle everyone faces. Because it is seen as a natural process of life, not very much research has been done on how to stop or prevent aging. Lillegard plans to change that with her ASR project this year. “If you view something as a problem, then you can look for solutions,” Lillegard said.
Every student in SPA’s Advanced Science Research class gets to pick a topic to experiment with, and at the end of the course, students will prepare a paper to submit to a science competition. This year, projects have covered topics regarding the environment, biology, botany and more. Lillegard’s particular field of research is aging, or more specifically, the impact trans-resveratrol, a common antioxidant, has on increasing longevity
When she was in sixth grade, Lillegard visited Norway to see her great-grandmother, who proceeded to mistake Lillegard for her mother. “To be fair I guess we look similar enough if you look at old photos but it was an odd experience for an 11-year-old,” Lillegard said. This experience sparked her interest in the topic of aging. Preliminary research about experiments she could conduct led her to find research about trans-resveratrol.
Trans-resveratrol can be taken as a dietary supplement but can also be found in foods like berries, peanuts and red wine. Studies on resveratrol, a form of trans-resveratrol, have shown positive results in stopping age-related symptoms, at least in non-human organisms (NCBI).
Lillegard thinks trans-resveratrol can increase a person’s lifespan, so she plans to test the consumption of trans-resveratrol on C. elegans, which are worm-like organisms with a similar genetic makeup to humans. She will experiment with five groups of C. elegans, one as a control group with no trans-resveratrol and the rest with increasing concentrations of the supplement. Then, Lillegard will gather the average lifespans of each group to confirm or refute her original hypothesis.

The biggest challenge Lillegard currently faces is planting the trans-resveratrol in the C. elegans’ food, E. coli. Tracking specific C. elegans has also been challenging because they reproduce quickly, but she plans to dye them with methylene blue to make them stand out. Despite these challenges, Lillegard likes working in a lab environment and designing her own experiments. “Having my own project and getting to decide what I’m going to do with it is just super cool,” Lillegard said.
After she graduates, Lillegard wants to study to become an M.D. or get a Ph.D. to continue her research. She hopes to dive deeper into topics of interest she couldn’t include in this project, like telomere replacement therapy (NCBI). Her goal is to bring more attention to aging and its consequences that affect every person on Earth. Lillegard believes that further studies and exploration could lead to finding a cure for the “incurable” disease of aging.