Yi Lin Zhang
Hometown: China
University: University of Illinois
Major: Materials Science and Engineering
BIOGRAPHY
I was born in Zhengzhou China and because both of my parents were international chemical traders so I had opportunities to travel to many countries when I was little. I was fascinated by the different lifestyle and cultures of North America. So I immigrated to Canada when I was 15 for better education opportunities and I later decided to come to University of Illinois for its famous material science and engineering program. I love the great atmosphere of innovation in this campus and I have founded HXT Group International Inc at late 2008 with my friends in Canada and USA to provide web page cloud storage, email and project initiation integration platform. Our multi operating system web cloud services have attracted over 2000 subscribers/users in the first three months of launching. I decided to sell my share of the business to my partner because of the entrance of web giant like Amazon, Google and Apple. Right now I am dedicating my time into undergraduate scientific research with Prof. John A. Rogers on bio electrical circuit. I love traveling in different ways and I am currently co-enrolled in University of Illinois Aviation Department for my first private pilot license. I also have competed in rally car extreme races of over 1500 kilometers length with a used Ford Focus. But riding a bike across USA is going to be a whole new experiences for me. I hope I can not only contribute in fighting cancers by doing research at school, but also doing this extraordinary event with my friends to inspire the ones who are in pain.
PERSONAL STATEMENT
I was born in the one of the most overpopulated and poor provinces in China and the health care at my city was under-developed. As a child, I was often overdosed with antibiotic medicine for a quick cure so my immune system was devastated by the effect of drug resistance. I had to visit hospitals almost once every week and I met many cancer patients in the main hall of hospital. At that time, I had very vague idea of what cancer was and what could cancer do to a healthy human being. The image of those pale faces after the chemotherapy was burned into my head and the fear of death first haunted me. Later, my aunt was diagnosed with Leukemia. The hemorrhagic spots under skin causes by the dead blood cells scared me so much and I started to realized how horrible such disease was. At the senior year of high school, my childhood best friend was diagnosed with Leukemia as well. The hate of desperation urged me to choose bio material as my college major and I had set my goals to help those people in need. Even though sometimes people around me do not understand my passionate for nano medicine, I always believe that everyone should be involved in the war of cancer not only to help others, but also to help themselves in the future. If there is a disease that can be considered as a death sentence, action must taken to prevent the spread of the illness as god give everyone of us a chance to live a happy life and cancer should not take away the right of those patients.