Bailey enjoys participating in her school's science and math clubs and also plays volleyball and basketball. She'd like to become a doctor, because her grandparents "died of curable diseases."
Bailey's father, a state forester, told her about an invasive species of beetle found in shipping crates. Foresters know very little about this bug, the banded elm bark beetle. Bailey found one research paper, translated from Russian, and learned that the bugs have been found on only one species of tree in the United States, an elm. She decided to learn more about the beetle's life cycle.
Bailey began by observing a Siberian elm branch infested with the beetles. She determined the life cycle to be about one month. She saw purple sap and fine sawdust where the beetles bore into the branch. She observed larva feeding on the soft cambium layer of the tree, turning it to mush. She then observed the beetles with samples of the American elm and other local tree species. The beetles died off in all the samples but the two types of elm she tested. Bailey concluded that the elms are in the most danger from this invasion.
