Student to study ET life

By Katie Williams
Collegian Editor
April 2, 2008

Studying extraterrestrial life seems like a pipe dream to many. It’s a profession only attainable if you live in the movies, or spend your life in a secret government lab. Most people would not even know how to get involved in the field. One La Salle student, however, not only knew where to look, but is about to spend his summer doing something others only dream about.

Katie Williams - Matt Levit will work with SETI this summer.

“I don’t see why it’s a big deal,” said sophomore biology major Matthew Levit.

Levit’s summer internship will take him to California, where he will be working with the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute. There he will be studying ice samples from the Artic region.

“I’ll be looking at molecules from space and seeing if they are similar to the molecules on Earth,” said Levit. “Basically, we want to see if the ice samples from a comet could have carried or sustained living beings.

“It all boils down to seeing if life originated from comets,” he explained.

Levit didn’t set out to work with extraterrestrial life; he fell into this internship by chance. He applied to 20 different internship programs, and this one, sponsored by the National Science Foundation Program, happened to be the first one he heard back from.

“I had only applied to two astro-biological programs, this one and one at Penn State,” Levit said. “I found them by basically just searching on the Internet. Anyone can apply.”

After Levit was accepted, he was given a list of 10 different projects that he could work on. From this he selected his top three choices. Working with ice samples was actually Levit’s third choice. His first choice was to simulate Martian soil and life on Mars in the desert. His second choice was to study the bacteria existing in extreme environments to see how they can survive.

Levit attributes receiving this internship to three La Salle teachers, Dr. Michael Prushan of the chemistry department, Dr. William Price, also from the chemistry department and Dr. Gerald Ballough, of the biology department.

Levit is also working with Prushan, researching protein folding.

“It’s biochemistry experiments with proteins. In two weeks I have to present my findings during three seminars. Two are at La Salle, and one is at St. Joe’s,” Levit said.

Teachers’ influence on Levit is perhaps most evident by his future career plans, as he wants to become a college professor.

“I do not want to go to medical school, which is unconventional for a biology student at La Salle, as that’s seen as a pre-med program,” Levit said. “I’d like to go to graduate school and become a university professor.”

Levit is baffled by the amount of interest people have in his summer internship.

“I’m not the only one doing these kinds of programs,” he said. “Two friends of mine are also doing research over the summer. It’s not just luck. If you applied to enough places, then you can get a summer internship.”

Though, he admits, “mine is a little unconventional.”

petnerr1@lasalle.edu