Margaret Hitt

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Margaret E. Hitt graduated summa cum laude and is an International Baccalaureate® (IB) Diploma scholar from Herbert Henry Dow High School in Midland, Michigan. She plans to major in Biomedical Engineering on the pre-med track at Columbia University, followed by an MD/PhD focusing on space medicine and technology.

Margaret has always been interested in science and engineering. Her fascination with its outer space applications ignited in 7th grade when she conducted her first space botany experiments on optimizing biomass production of four NASA cultivars under the Growing Beyond Earth® (GBE) Program, guided by Dr. Gioia Massa from NASA Kennedy Space Center. This experience instilled an appreciation for the design and execution of scientific experiments. During her freshman year of high school, Margaret founded a Space Farming Club dedicated to contributing to NASA's research on cultivating plants in space. The club's research projects have received top awards from the GBE Student Research Symposium every year, covering topics such as water conservation, nutrient use efficiency, LED light impact on plant growth in space, and optimizing antioxidant and nitrate balance in space-grown vegetables. Margaret has also led her research club to present their findings at various space conferences, including the International Space Station Research and Development Conference, the American Society for Gravitational and Space Research Conference, and the Michigan Space Grant Consortium Conference.

Margaret's dedication extends to innovating creative solutions for biomedical problems and health issues caused by space travel-induced stress. She has conducted twenty-seven astrobiology experiments and engineered five space-agriculture solutions to recommend spaceflight stress-resilient cultivars to NASA. Margaret also spearheaded a point-of-care wearable project under the NASA HUNCH program with a two-year grant from a regional engineering innovation award for her space farmer club. This multi-year project aims to develop a microcontroller-based sweat cortisol biosensor that can offer tailored countermeasures against spaceflight stressors and potentially be used to evaluate the psychological benefits of space farming. She collaborated with local STEM professionals, engineering professors at Michigan State University and Western Michigan University, and biotech labs and companies. Through her work, the project made it to the HUNCH Final Design Review at NASA Johnson Space Center, where NASA scientists and engineers viewed the project. Margaret hopes to continue developing this technology at Columbia University.

Margaret's passion for engineering is exemplified by her involvement with local STEM centers at Central Michigan University and Michigan State University, where she collaborated to create assistive materials for the visually impaired and develop robotics applications to support work and life in space and under extreme conditions on Earth through the FIRST® Robotics programs since 5th grade. She is also passionate about utilizing her passion for math to solve engineering problems. In her sophomore and junior years, Margaret investigated plant gravitropism and phototropism. She developed a mathematical model that effectively targets light treatments with a 4.6% error rate to render crops suitable for space missions.

Through her paid NASA Internship with GeneLab, Margaret worked under the guidance of Dr. Elizabeth Blaber from NASA Ames Research Center and Biomedical Engineering Department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, NY. She learned omics-based bioinformatics research to leverage her data analysis and research capacity. During the internship, Margaret studied spaceflight effects on intracellular communication in the NASA model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana, focusing on spaceflight-induced stress on cell wall remodeling related to IRX7 silencing and overexpressing. Her research team investigated how to address cell wall stress in Arabidopsis thaliana through the unfolded protein response. They presented their findings, titled "Investigating the Relationship Between the Cell Wall Integrity Pathway and Unfolded Protein Response in Arabidopsis thaliana,” at the 39th Annual Meeting for the American Society for Gravitational and Space Research (ASGSR) 2023 Conference, where they won First Place in the high school poster competition.

After graduating high school, Margaret participated in NASA's Open Science AI/ML Training for Space Biology, where she learned essential machine learning and artificial intelligence methods to predict biological phenotypic responses to spaceflight and simulated conditions. Margaret is currently working under Dr. James Casaletto from the NASA Ames Research Center. They are utilizing AI/ML methods to analyze RR9 data to determine genes causally related or robustly correlated to the phenotypes regarding intra-ocular pressure and microscopy. They aim to publish the research in a medical journal.

Apart from her research and engineering projects, Margaret enjoys reading, playing musical instruments, and dancing ballet. She has played the piano for 14 years and earned First Class Honors with Distinction in the Royal Conservatory of Music practical and theory certificate exams through Level 10. Additionally, Margaret advanced to States in piano and cello at Michigan's Solo and Ensemble Festivals for four consecutive years and was nominated as Outstanding Soloist for piano in 2024. As First Chair cellist in her high school, she was a cellist and pianist in the pit orchestra in her school's production of “Into the Woods” and “Alice by Heart” and played various gigs in her community.                             

Experiences like these fostered Margaret’s inner drive to sustain resources for learning, including renovating an old classroom into a robot workshop, turning a dining room into a space botany laboratory, and fundraising to support STEM projects. Margaret also designed monthly STEM workshops to teach her peers about data analysis, rigorous scientific research, and related math and physics concepts. In addition, she organized STEM outreach events for her community and, as a result, inspired two other schools in Michigan to begin a space botany club and established an Astrobiology STEM Activation Program (ASAP) in her school district. ASAP is a four-week program that aligns with the Michigan Science Standards and IB PYP for grades K-5 and engages students in applying their knowledge from the plant science unit to explore space science, astrobiology research, and aerospace engineering, aiming to inspire a future generation of space scientists.

Margaret’s research, performing arts, and resource integration experiences will aid in her collaborations at Columbia, contributing to scientific research, engineering projects, cross-disciplinary innovations, youth education, and various endeavors in sustaining Columbia’s diverse and collaborative community.