To celebrate Elon University’s Spring Undergraduate Research Forum on April 29, Elon is highlighting several students presenting their research at the annual campus tradition.
College can be a big transition, but researchers at Elon University, including Patrick Fahnoe ’27, are studying how they can make that transition easier.
Fahnoe, a biology major, is part of a research team for a study examining behavior changes and long-term health risks related to a student’s transition from high school to college. In 2021, Elon was awarded a three-year grant from the National Institutes of Health, enabling researchers to track high school seniors through their first year in college to assess their risk of developing metabolic syndrome, a precursor to cardiovascular disease.
Fahnoe’s specific area of this study investigates the relationship between stress produced from the college admission and moving process to body composition factors, such as body fat percentage and inflammation factors. Over a year, a high school senior who visit Elon for a tour or program are recruited and go through an initial round of tests, before completing their second round if they return to Elon as a student or attend another college.
During their trials, the students are tested for heart rate variability and arterial stiffness, their anthropometrics are checked to calibrate the HRV and AS equipment, and blood is drawn to determine biomarkers. In between trials, Fahnoe and other researchers study sleep patterns and activity levels via monitors worn throughout participants’ daily lives. Overall, 186 participants signed up, and 80 are expected to complete it in full, which is around a 43% completion rate for this year’s study.
Svetlana Nepocatych, professor of exercise science, welcomed Fahnoe into the study and became his mentor. She, along with researchers including Christina Westbrooks ’23, Elle Nash ’25, Kaitlyn Sumner ’25, and Carolyn Oliver ’24, taught him how to take blood from participants and run tests.
“She’s very willing to let us make our own mistakes, which is how I learned and grew in this study,” Fahnoe said. “She’s very involved, very willing to help us with whatever we need, and I don’t think this project would be the same without her.”
Fahnoe, whose main job is drawing blood from participants and testing blood, can receive a variety of information, such as cholesterol, high-density Lipoprotein (HDL), triglycerides and alanine transaminase levels. Fahnoe specifically investigates interleukin-6 (IL6) within the blood because it is an inflammatory factor closely linked to invisible diseases such as stress and depression. In addition, Fahnoe and his team also conduct a dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), which provides information on the subjects’ bone density, fat mass, and lean mass.
Before coming to Elon, Fahnoe remembers visiting for Fellows Weekend, hearing about the study, and wanting to be a part of it as a participant or researcher. During his general Chemistry I class, Carolyn Oliver ’24 told Fahnoe about her participation in the study, and there was an opening for another researcher.
“I said ‘absolutely yes’, and when I jumped onto the study, it was just pure dumb luck that I got the opportunity,” Fahnoe said.
The data collection of the three-year-long study will finish in late May, and next year, Fahnoe and his team will start in-depth data analysis. Fahnoe says research projects like this one, give science majors a “first peek behind the curtain,” because students can implement the scientific method into real-life situations with public impacts.
“I hypothesize that there will be an increase in stress, as well as changes in body composition factors like weight,” Fahnoe said. “The fat percentage could be up or down because people have different responses to stress, but we anticipate a change regardless.”
Fahnoe presented his work during the Spring Undergraduate Research Forum on April. During SURF Day, all other campus activities are suspended so the Elon community can come together around students’ creative endeavors and research efforts. Undergraduate research is also one of the five Elon Experiences, which provide a natural extension of the work students do in the classroom and ensure that Elon graduates are prepared for both graduate school and careers.
Fahnoe believes that studying the transition to college at a university is important because it allows Elon and other colleges to better educate future students on the physical and mental changes they will experience becoming a college freshman and better assist in the process. Having a biological explanation with data to back up these findings can emphasize the message.
“This could be incorporated as a freshman orientation message saying, ‘This is college. You are going to be stressed and undergo some change. Here are some preliminary resources to deal with that and places to contact for extra help.’”
Fahnoe would like to expand this project with more participants and a deeper analysis of the impact of any preexisting stressors, and whether the existence of those stressors affects the stress produced during the transition to college.