The Sunnyvale Sun

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Hwang has a hands-on approach to publishing

Triple Helix gains popularity on campuses nationwide

By ANNE WARD ERNST

Sometimes learning by doing can be as valuable as a lecture in an Ivy League classroom. For two Cornell University students from Sunnyvale and Cupertino, starting The Triple Helix, an internationally growing nonprofit publication, was a once-in-a-lifetime exercise.

"It's all about the experience. I've learned so much that it's really hard to put into words or quantify. I've been a part of an organization that rose from absolutely nothing to great success. Along the way, I've gained experience that you just can't get in a classroom," Ilya Sukhar said.

Sukhar, a junior at Cornell University, is from Sunnyvale and graduated from Harker School in San Jose with Cupertino's Kevin Hwang.

The Triple Helix is a biannual print journal fully operated and written by students. Hwang, the journal's founder and chief executive officer, said, "The organization exists to positively impact society as well as the student staff involved. The Triple Helix aims to promote awareness and a better understanding of many of the legal, social, ethical and political concerns for the next generation of science and technology. In addition, student staff involved not only gain knowledge of issues they read and write about, but they also gain experience in writing, editing, publishing, business management, marketing, organization, and much, much more."

The idea for the journal came to Hwang from his own interdisciplinary interests. He has a double major in economics and molecular and cell biology.

"I founded the organization at Cornell as just a regular student publication on campus with no idea or intentions of ever expanding nationally or internationally. I have very interdisciplinary interests, and no journal on campus really encouraged articles through an interdisciplinary perspective, so I created The Triple Helix. In addition, I've always been very entrepreneurial, so I thought this would be a really interesting and exciting challenge," he said.

Online, archive issues of the print edition are available in PDF format, and shorter pieces are posted on a weekly and biweekly basis. The name, derived from the false hypothesis that DNA is a triple-helix structure, reflects the journal's structure. Though the triple-helix theory was disproved, it sparked dialogue, debate and progress. TTH looks to do the same within its pages.

TTH intersects three topics--science, society and law--and its student-authored articles examine the relationship of the three in such areas as genetically engineered food, space travel privatization and watershed management.

"We expose undergraduates to interdisciplinary issues that don't arise in the typical curriculum and give them a chance to write scholarly articles or lead in a high-paced environment," Sukhar said.

The Triple Helix, begun in 2004 at Cornell, is a national 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, publishing for the first time in spring 2005. There are now 16 chapters across the United States, Europe, Asia and Australia, and it is still growing. In the United States, chapters exist in such prestigious schools as University of California-Berkeley, Yale University, Harvard University, Dartmouth College, Johns Hopkins and MIT. Chapters are being organized in such schools as Oxford University, Duke University and National University of Singapore, and plans include establishing chapters in U.S. high schools.

Each chapter produces content for its own sections and uses material from the nationally standardized journal.

Hwang enlisted the help of his friend, Sukhar, TTH's chief technology officer, who is responsible for developing the journal's online presence and oversees the use of technology throughout the organization.

Another high school friend and MIT student, Arjun Naskar from Los Altos Hills, is the executive director of internal affairs. Together with students at Cornell, UC-Berkeley, Johns Hopkins and Carnegie Mellon, they make up the board of directors.

Each student leader brings something different to the organization, from technology to marketing to entrepreneurship, and each gains invaluable experience.

"I've learned first-hand about group dynamics, project management, initiative, funding, etc. These are the keys to success, and this kind of experience is about as hands-on as it gets," Sukhar said.

"We've managed to do something that's never been done in the realm of student organizations. For an undergraduate, this kind of experience is equivalent to joining Microsoft on the ground floor."

For more information or to view the journal, visit www.thetriplehelix.org.