My name is Abbas Idris, I currently do work on graphene and my dream is to develop single molecule sequencing technology further than its current
limitations. I first got interested in this field after doing a Genomics project my junior year of high school. At the time and up until my senior year, I was enrolled in the Governor's School at George Mason's Price William campus. I had been working on a graphic user interface for genomic analyses when I realized how wonderful it would be to sequence an entire human genome. After the project (my senior year), I became more interested in this idea and dreamt of creating an efficient sequencing tool so that I could do my own personal genomics work. I ran into many third generation sequencing devices, but I was particularly amazed at the potential of single molecule sequencing. Not knowing how to make an impact in this innovation, I originally wanted to pursue other methods of sequencing and reinvent them. However, I have since began chasing the idea of single molecule sequencing using a graphene nanopore. The first few weeks of my research I spent time in the lab working on the previous idea, but for the past couple of weeks I have spent hours delving into interesting articles that have shaped the direction of my work. One thing I have discovered is that threading a DNA molecule through graphene focuses too much on ion displacement that on the individual nitrogenous bases on a molecules
