Tiffeny Chen

Tiffeny developed her passion for research when she was selected to participate in her middle school’s selective Saturday Science Honors Program. Tiffeny was intrigued by the challenge posed by the global water crisis causing her to set out on the journey to finding the solution. Tiffeny has served as team leader on the projects she has worked on during her time in the program. In sophomore year, she investigated the efficiency of a novel set up of solar stills with the addition of nanofluids which successfully converted saline water to drinkable water (satisfying WHO guidelines). In junior year, Tiffeny decided to investigate the potential of microbial desalination cells (MDCs). She focused on testing different types of configurations and optimizing the designs for scalability and productivity. For her research, she was named as a Siemens Competition Semifinalist twice and was selected as a finalist to present her work for the Columbia Undergraduate Science Journal.

The summer prior to senior year, Tiffeny secured a research internship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She conducted research at the Hatton Laboratory and worked under graduate student Yinying Ren on the usage of polymer gels for removal of organics.

Besides research, Tiffeny has served as co-captain of the varsity Science Olympiad team and an advisor for the middle school team. She has enjoyed participating in extracurriculars such as serving her community in Red Cross, discussing global issues in Model UN and cheering for teammates in fencing. In her free time, Tiffeny also enjoys going on food adventures with her friends and bingewatching episodes of sitcoms.