Buck furthers passion for chemistry with research experiences on way to graduating with three degrees

Buck furthers passion for chemistry with research experiences on way to graduating with three degrees

Looking back on her four years at Northwest Missouri State University, Kiersten Buck is taking pride in the ways she took advantage of experiences Northwest offers - which helped her develop a clearer vision of where she wants to take her career.

"One of the big draws (to Northwest) was the nano program and how interdisciplinary it was," Buck said. "That's something I feel very strongly about. I enjoy being able to learn lots of different things and apply that wide foundation of knowledge to a lot of different situations and problem solve in unique ways."

In May, Buck graduated from Northwest with the highest honors - summa cum laude. She did it while earning three Bachelor of Science degrees - chemistry: medicinal chemistry, nanoscience: nanoscale biology and nanoscience: nanoscale chemistry.

In the fall, she will begin work on a Ph.D. in medicinal chemistry at the University of Minnesota. Eventually, she aspires to work in the pharmaceutical industry.

Path to Northwest

Buck caught the bug to study chemistry as a high school student in Kansas City, Missouri, and had Northwest on her radar as a potential college destination. When most of her college visit plans fell apart because institutions limited their offerings during the COVID-19 pandemic, she found people at Northwest to be friendly and more willing to connect with her.

Shelley Riley, a former associate professor of chemistry who retired from Northwest in 2023, especially made an impression on Buck, who saw the University as an avenue to build solid, foundational knowledge - not just in chemistry but physics and biology, too.

"(Riley) walked me through the various programs Northwest had and the nano program specifically, which was really interesting to me because I knew I wanted to go on and do more research down the line," Buck said. "I knew I was interested in interdisciplinary science, but I wasn't sure exactly what field. The fact that there was an established, very highly interdisciplinary program put Northwest really far up there early on."

As she progressed through her coursework, research opportunities with Northwest faculty started to find Buck. She counts Dr. Mohammed Meziani, Dr. Hunter McFall-Boegeman, Dr. Sarah McFall-Boegeman and Dr. Gretchen Thornsberry as important mentors and advisors who supported her interests and helped her practice her skills beyond their classrooms.

Buck says Northwest became an anchor that helped orient her in a field for which she is passionate.

"It's not starting from scratch, trying to figure out, 'Ok, what even is this field?'" she said. "It's, 'Ok, I remember this a little bit from this class I took a couple years ago. Ok, let's get a refresher on that. How does that connect here?' It makes it a lot easier to fill in the gaps."

Profession-based experiences

Propelled by the knowledge and experience she gained early at Northwest, Buck was among just 11 students selected from about 700 applicants to participate in a 10-week Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program during the summer of 2023 at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. She worked in its Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, investigating a human protein and practicing restriction cloning.

"It gets you in the lab for like eight hours a day, five days a week, closer to what you'd experience as a graduate student," Buck said. "You're working directly under a graduate student in a doctoral-level research lab, and they also have lots of professional academic development-type workshops that help you figure out how to navigate applying to graduate schools as well as what exactly you're getting into."

The internship at Cornell helped Buck realize she wanted to pursue chemistry at a deeper level. So, during the summer of 2024, Buck headed to George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where she participated in another 10-week REU program focused on biochemistry research. That exposed her to in-depth organic synthesis, molecular design and lab meetings with graduate students.

Buck embraced opportunities during her internships to work with and learn among cohorts of students from throughout the world. Having never traveled by herself prior to her summer in New York, Buck enjoyed exploring different environments, learning about other cultures and broadening her network.

"Figuring out how to navigate those different situations, I think, has also definitely helped me be a bit more self-assured," Buck said. "You learn how to adapt and handle situations on the fly."

In March, she gained additional experience by presenting the research she conducted at George Washington University to an audience at the American Chemical Society's Spring Meeting and Expo in San Diego.

While the massive conference draws people from all over the world and features hundreds of professional development and research presentations, Buck's poster was selected to represent her discipline at SCI-MIX, an interdisciplinary poster session showcasing the best presentations - a major accomplishment, especially for an undergraduate student.

Buck says Northwest helped her gain confidence in her presentation skills, but the chance to present in San Diego and hear from researchers at large companies was special.

"I went to presentations where they had representatives from the big pharma companies presenting some of their work and their projects that they were at a point where they could share with the public," Buck said. "There were professors and people from companies there presenting, and just the absolute breadth of everything that was going on was insane. It was so cool."

Campus activities

Back on the Northwest campus, Buck was a member of the Society of President's Scholars, and she played oboe in the Wind Symphony and Symphonic Band.

She was active in the Northwest chapter of Gamma Sigma Epsilon, the chemistry honor society, for which she was secretary. She also helped Northwest restart its student chapter of the American Chemical Society and served as its president.

While those organizations largely focus on connecting students with professional development and research, the groups plan activities for fun, too. Last fall, the American Chemical Society hosted an event to blow up pumpkins outside the Garrett-Strong Science Building, and it hosted a food chemistry night in the spring that featured ice cream made with liquid nitrogen.

Buck's parting advice now as a college graduate is simple: "Just try."

"If you have even like an inkling of 'This might be interesting' or 'This might be a thing to do,' go ahead and try it," Buck said. "Because the worst thing that's going to happen is someone tells you you can't do it. Best case scenario, you end up doing it, meeting some people, learning something new about a field, about yourself and getting some cool experiences."