A blight on tomato plants is a blessing for the inquiring mind of Aaron Yeoh. A sophomore molecular biology major, Yeoh is part of the Manduca InSTaRs project, a Kenyon collaborative of undergraduate and faculty researchers in biology and mathematics who are studying metabolic scaling (the relationship between metabolic rate and size) in the tobacco hawkmoth, the familiar "hornworm" known to gardeners as a pain in the lycopene.

Yeoh began his research towards the end of his freshman year and expanded it in the Kenyon Summer Science Scholars program, where—mentored by his advisor, biology professor Chris Gillen—he fed, weighed, and dissected the tomato-loving caterpillars. "They're fascinating creatures," he said. "They hatch at one milligram and double their weight every day until they grow 10,000-fold to the weight of a small mouse in less than three weeks. That makes them a good model for our study about the effect of size on biological function. A lot of what dictates an animal's size and shape comes down to metabolic scaling."

"To appear at these conferences is a huge honor, something I never thought I would be doing at the undergraduate level."

Following just one summer of research, Yeoh was given two opportunities to present his findings from his genetic testing of tissue samples: in the fall at the Ohio Physiological Society conference at Ohio State University and in the winter at the annual meeting of The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Seattle. "To appear at these conferences is a huge honor, something I never thought I would be doing at the undergraduate level," Yeoh said. "The science program here is pretty amazing, everything I hoped it would be."

Yeoh serves on Sophomore Council and is a member of the Alpha Delta Phi and the KC-MEDS premed club. He plays cello in the Knox County Symphony and recently began volunteering Sundays in the emergency department at Knox County Hospital. "I'm interested in going to medical or graduate school, and I want to gain as much exposure to medicine as I can. Kenyon gives me that opportunity."