Engineering physics major, Karen Vaughn, offered NSF and NDSEG Fellowships
Karen Vaughn, a graduating senior from Case Western Reserve University, faces a tough decision as a new graduate. Having received two major awards to support her graduate education at the University of California at Berkeley, Vaughn will have to decide between accepting the National Science Foundation Fellowship or the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship.
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Vaughn came to the university as a transfer student from Grove City College in Pennsylvania. She says she chose Case Western Reserve for its opportunities to participate in undergraduate research projects and has spent the last two years working with physics professor Charles Rosenblatt’s research group on the study of liquid crystals.
The Rosenblatt group’s research project examined ways to control the liquid crystal orientation on a surface by controlling the “pre-tilt” angle, with the ultimate goal of achieving this on a pixel-by-pixel basis using ink-jet technology.
“If we are successful, we will be able to develop new types of switchable optical gratings for purposes of laser beam steering and optical communications,” said Rosenblatt.
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For her senior capstone project, Vaughn designed a microelectrical mechanical system (MEMS) resonator and tested the use of silicon carbide as a potential material for the resonator. She worked on the research with Mehran Mehregany, Goodrich Professor of Engineering Innovation at the Case School of Engineering and one of the pioneers of MEMS research. She plans to continue that area of research when she heads to Berkeley in the fall where she will pursue her interests in MEMS and optoelectronics.
While engineering research takes up much of her time, Vaughn has found time to continue developing her skills as a fencer and participated in the Midwestern Conference Championship. She also spends her off-campus time snow skiing in winter and water skiing in summer and thinks the two sports might translate into surfing if she has a chance to try it during her studies not far from the Pacific Ocean.
Since childhood, Vaughn said never doubted she would go into the sciences.
“I grew up in a science-minded family,” she said, adding that her father is an engineer with several patents on inventions and an uncle is a chemist.
Having fun with her father, she recalls how he conducted an experiment in the kitchen using the car battery to show the Vaughn children how to create an electromagnet and another one growing bean seeds in different soil and amounts of water to track growth.
Alliance/Merck Ciencia (Science) Hispanic Scholars Program
In a $4 million commitment, the Alliance is being supported by the Merck Company Foundation and the Merck Institute for Science Education (MISE) to establish the Alliance/Merck Ciencia Hispanic Scholars Program.
During the next Five years, the Program will provide 50 promising Hispanic high school students from Brownsville, TX; Elizabeth, NJ; and Los Angeles, CA with $42,500 in college scholarships and internship
support to pursue STEM degrees. In addition, 125 Hispanic college students nationwide majoring in a STEM field will receive $2,000 scholarships.
See more fellowships opportunities in our science and engineering fellowship directory.
Josh Wood, computer engineering major at Valparaiso:
Wood is one of 200 undergraduate students in the country selected to receive a 2008 National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship. More than 3,400 applications were reviewed by the research offices of the U.S. Navy, Air Force and Army from individuals pursuing graduate work in science and engineering disciplines of military importance.
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Earlier this semester, Wood became the third Valparaiso engineering student in four years to be named to the All-USA College Academic Team, selected by USA Today to recognize the nation’s most outstanding undergraduate students. USA Today named Wood to its Third Team in part because of his research in nanocomputer technology, including determining how to do matrix multiplication using quantum computing techniques.
This winter, Wood was one of only a handful of undergraduate students invited to two professional conferences – the International Semiconductor Device Research Symposium and the Applied Power Electronics Conference – to present research that could lead to improvements in the performance of microprocessors, which provide the brainpower for computers and an increasing array of consumer electronic devices such as iPods.
Related: Carnegie Mellon Engineering Students Win NDSEG Fellowships - Gustavus Alumna Receives Prestigious Fellowship - NDSEG Fellow: Heather Beem
Christopher Colson and Sarah (Grochowski) Lukes (photo), are both working on their doctorates in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Two MSU students receive NSF research fellowships
Colson, who used to be a nuclear engineer officer on a submarine, will focus on power systems related to alternative energy. Lukes, who was MSU’s top engineering student in 2005, will work to improve the focus controls on optical instruments used in surgery.
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Before coming to MSU, Colson, a native of Washington, D.C., graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1999 and served most of seven years on a submarine. When his service ended, Colson said he was “kind of reborn as an electrical engineer” and decided to attend graduate school. He was attracted to MSU because of its strong power systems program. “I always knew I wanted to pursue research,” Colson added.
His time on the submarine was all about nuclear energy, Colson said. He will use his fellowship to work on power management of power generation systems as they relate to alternative energy. “It’s an absolutely relevant topic for the NSF to be supporting,” Colson said.
Lukes, a native of Casper, Wyo., will use her fellowship to improve the focus controls on optical imaging devices. She will work in the Montana Microfabrication Facility at MSU and apply her understanding of mechanical systems to catheter-based microscopy.
Lukes earned her undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering. She became interested in research and developed her abilities through internships, Lukes said. At the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., she analyzed the joint space in knees and attended several conferences on transplants and related technology. At Boston Scientific, she was involved in stent development. When she interned with Ross Snider at MSU, she helped analyze neurological data from crickets. She learned machining while working in Doug Cairns’ composite materials laboratory at MSU.
Two graduating seniors taking $100K-plus fellowships to MIT
Among other research projects, Palmer traveled to Armenia, where he had previously served a two-year mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to research economic benefits of higher education there. Funding for the field study and preparatory research came from a grant from BYU’s Office of Research and Creative Activities.
After returning, he continued his research and made it the focus of his honors senior thesis. “My research work is so indicative of the complete BYU experience,” Palmer said. “It ties together my mission, interacting with international governmental representatives on campus, mentoring from the economics faculty, and help from the Honors Department to get my applications together for funding.”
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Across campus in a laboratory in the engineering building, Landon’s undergraduate experience involved considerable hands-on work studying how to make materials stronger and last longer. He eventually was the lead author on a paper published in an academic journal and a co-author on several others. In addition to the NSF Fellowship, Landon won the prestigious National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship, which is worth approximately $200,000 (although he’s only allowed to use one at a time).
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Three recent BYU graduates were also named 2008 NSF Fellows and are already in graduate school:
Marian Adamson is studying bioengineering at the University of Michigan. Brigham Frandsen will welcome Palmer into the economics program at MIT. Adam Washburn is studying analytical chemistry at the University of Illinois.
Heather Beem, mechanical engineering major, Oklahoma State University. Beem and Larry Hoberock, professor and head of OSU’s School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, are pictured with a silverware sorting prototype she helped design and build in the school’s Robotics Laboratory. OSU engineering student receives $232,000 fellowship
She will enroll at MIT in the fall, after traveling to China this summer to see Olympic venues, Three Gorges Dam and other modern marvels as part of a study abroad short-course for OSU engineering students, and serving a summer research internship at NASA Ames Academy in California.
“Oklahoma State University is extremely proud of Heather,” said OSU President Burns Hargis. “The best representation of the ideals of OSU is our outstanding students, and Heather is a remarkable example.
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“My dad is an aquatic biologist, and when I was growing up, he’d take me tromping through the streams of Oklahoma to take measurements and look at fish,” Beem said. “I’ve had an interest in that for a while now, and the ocean is a huge frontier with lots of things to discover.”
Beem, who graduated from Norman North High School in 2003 at age 15, discovered engineering through an Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education summer academy. “I really enjoyed learning how to tackle interesting problems in my high school physics class,” Beem said. “I also liked building things, and then I participated in one of those free summer academies after my senior year.”
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During a tour of the National Taipei University of Technology, Beem, who is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and German, met and convinced researchers to hire her for an internship. “I was originally just going to visit, but they were working on a bioengineering application using the antibacterial properties of silver in wound dressings, and I thought it was really interesting,” Beem said.
“They want to use nano-silver particles and, instead of a bandage you have to replace all the time, make a dressing that releases silver at a controlled rate,” she said. “It’s cleaner and much more effective than a bandage you have to constantly rip out and replace.” The work led to the first of several technical papers on which Beem has been principal author or co-author.
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In addition to serving as structures group leader for the OSU team that won the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Student Design/Build/Fly Competition in April, Beem was a member of a student group that designed and built a prototype, inflatable wing aircraft for NASA exploration of Mars. She considers the experiences her most memorable as an OSU engineering student.
“Being involved with Dr. (Jamey) Jacob’s Mars plane team, seeing the project all the way from concept to completion, and test launching it from a weather balloon 100,000 feet in the air was really exciting. At that point, I thought, ‘I’m really going to enjoy working with technology like this,’” Beem said. “The Design/Build/Fly was also a great experience, and winning first place made us all feel great.”
Related: Oklahoma State Biosystems Engineering Student Wins NSF GRF - Arizona State Students Receive NSF Fellowship
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