Student Spotlight: Sy Duke

Published Feb 02, 2026 by
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MY STORY​

What inspired you to study chemistry? ​
When I decided to come back to school and really try again, I knew I wanted to start by knocking out my pre-med classes. My dad encouraged me to try again so I enrolled in a summer EMT course, where at that time I had no idea what I wanted to major in. I mentioned that to a classmate who turned out to be an ECU chemistry alumnus, and he encouraged me to study chemistry and ended up helping me map out how to get started. His support made my transition back to school feel a lot less scary. Since then, the people in ECU’s chemistry department have kept me inspired! Everyone I’ve met genuinely loves what they do, and they’ve helped me find what I love too.​

Do you participate in research?
I applied for a summer research grant that Lisa Bennett shared with chemistry students and was thrilled to be accepted. That opportunity placed me in Dr. Lim’s lab, and I’ve been fortunate to continue there for the past two semesters. I’m hoping to stay on even longer, ideally through a master’s program!​

​My research in Dr. Lim’s laboratory focuses on transthyretin (TTR) misfolding and aggregation to investigate how pathogenic oligomeric species form and propagate. Recently, we have introduced site-specific fluorination into TTR and are using 19F NMR as a highly sensitive structural probe to monitor misfolding process. By integrating NMR measurements with kinetic time-course experiments, we aim to directly correlate structural transitions with changes in aggregation behavior. This work provides mechanistic insight into the pathways and rate-limiting steps that govern protein misfolding and aggregation.​

​ What interests do you have outside of academics? ​
Outside of school, I’ve been putting a lot of time into a few things I really care about. I started a nonprofit with two of my friends, Ethan and Matthew Wittenborn, focused on getting naloxone (a life-saving medication for opioid overdoses) into the places where it can make the biggest difference, especially bars and nightlife areas in Greenville. We’re starting local, but our goal is to expand to other college towns over time. On the technical side, I’ve also been building my own Raman spectrophotometer in my spare time! When I’m not doing any of that, I’m usually playing guitar, mostly metal and bluegrass.