Hey!

What’s a ghost’s favorite sport. Boocycling. Boosketball also works:).

Welcome back to my newsletter. Hope you had a wonderful and relaxing August.

For those who don't know, I'm Nina Khera. You may have met me during a meeting, or at the latest networking event in Boston. I'm a 16-year-old human longevity researcher who's working on projects from topics spanning cellular senescence (zombie cells) to epidermolysis bullosa (skin disease)!

This month I’ve done work on Biotein, applied to some colleges, ideated re my future brain aging plans, and worked on school!

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Biotein

We’ve been coordinating our next wet-lab study (many kits and reagents have arrived) and have been designing tech to contextualize our scoring! We hope to do the study ASAP once we are permitted to submit for IRB approval.

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Mindsets and Philosophy

Here are some thoughts I’ve been having!

I want to understand the perspectives around me in my lifetime. There are infinitely many thoughts and dreams and ideas that surround every single one of us. How could we not spend hours upon hours trying to better understand them? Trying to untangle the webs that make a whole, real person seems like a fascinating pastime.
On a tangent that’s arisen because of that, people like reality TV for a few reasons, in my opinion. Schadenfreude is one of them - aka a bit of self-satisfaction generated by others being a tad bit worse off than oneself. On a related note, it’s satisfying to distract yourself from the issues in your life and the mundaneness sometimes. Another reason, in my opinion, is that people want to connect with someone else. People tend to talk about reality TV stars like they know them… and oftentimes they feel like they do. Loneliness is an epidemic, and as such, parasocial relationships are oftentimes what this economy runs on - how many times have you supported a star not because of their work but because you want to support them? Food for thought.

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Knowledge Bytes

Here are some recommendations from the month!

- Interesting article/saga on cell-phone addiction: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/23/business/cell-phone-addiction.html I’ve always wanted to digital-detox.

- Great musical album: Midnights by Taylor Swift (I really recommend Paris and Lavender Haze).

- Great substack: thoughts and productivity. I have NO idea how I got signed up to it… but I’m glad I did? I’m pretty sure I’ve plugged them before. I will continue to do so. Interesting article summaries and recommendations.

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Shoutouts

Here are some fun shoutouts:

Thank you to Ichor and St. Lawrence for all your help in terms of coordinating our upcoming study.
Thank you to 1517 for honest and timely advice in terms of snags we’ve hit and also successes.
Thank you to Dr. Raju for some really interesting conversations about your work!

Thank you to everyone reading this. Even if I didn't mention you this month. you probably helped me a lot. Thank you!

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Next Month

In November, I’ll be working on Biotein, school, brain aging ideation, and college apps!

Reach out to me if you want to talk about human longevity (or just life sciences in general) or anything else honestly!

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nina-khera-115b5a175/

Personal Website: https://ninakhera.com/

Email: kheranina@gmail.com (or just reply to this email)

Nina’s Monthly Update

Aiming, Applying, and Anticipating: October