Phylogeny of the Taxaceae Inferred from Phytochrome Sequences

I used DNA data to look at the evolutionary history of the yew family. Some of those trees are important to cancer research and other industries, but their evolutionary history has been hard to place for a long time. Since evolution is reflected in DNA sequence, I was able to clearly show certain things about the evolutionary relationships between them and closely related trees, which is important to their classification.

Award Received: Navy award at regional science fair and top 10 in school science fair.

Name: Mark Adrian Chonofsky
Stats: 17 year-old Junior from Lexington High School in Lexington, MA
Influential Person: Dr. Susan Offner, my biology teacher
Career Goal: Some kind of science with hopefully some teaching mixed in. These goals are far from firm.
Field Interest: Last year, I used some similar algorithms on a different dataset and I got really interested in how DNA reflects evolution. I wanted to apply my knowledge to a new problem and so I learned about Taxaceae (yew trees).

Tags: education, innovation, inspire, Intel, Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, Intel ISEF

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