Seventh Grade Student Takes First Place at Chess Benefit for Autism

Congratulations to seventh grade student Alexandra who took first place in the U-11 section at the Third Annual Chess Benefit for Autism held at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on January 13.

Alexandra was one of almost 50 participants from the NYC region who tested their chess skills on the same grounds upon which world-class scientists test biological processes. Cold Spring Harbor Lab is home to eight Nobel laureates who discovered everything from “jumping genes” to the double helix structure of DNA.

The Chess Benefit was held to raise awareness of autism and raise money for research. In attendance was luminary scientist Dr. Michael Wigler who led a team of research investigators to the discovery of a “unified theory” of autism's genetic causation. Guest-speaker Dr. Michael Ronemus, a CSHL research investigator on this team, gave a fascinating lecture on the history of autism research and his personal work sequencing the human genome.