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Rensselaer Biomedical Engineering Students Win Prestigious Fellowships
New NSF Awards Add to Growing List of Biomedical
Engineering Graduate Student Fellowships
Two biomedical engineering students at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute were announced as winners of National
Science Foundation (NSF) graduate research fellowships. The
awards expand the growing list of biomedical engineering
students at Rensselaer who have secured prestigious national
and international fellowships.
The NSF announced last month that graduate student Sarah
Linley and senior Danielle Bogdanowicz were among the winners
of the 2011 National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship
Program Competition.
Linley, in the research group of Rensselaer Assistant
Professor
Eric Ledet, will advance her research into lower back pain.
She seeks to better understand how the compression and twisting
of intervertebral discs in the spine contribute to long-term
degenerative disc disease. Bogdanowicz, graduating from
Rensselaer this month, was an undergraduate researcher in the
lab of Rensselaer Assistant Professor
Deanna Thompson. She will use the grant to advance her
research using stem cells to regrow and repair bone and
cartilage.
“NSF Graduate Research Fellowships are highly competitive
and prestigious awards. Along with preparing excellent
proposals and executing high-level research, these students are
expected to clearly demonstrate the broader impacts and
societal benefit of their work,” said
Deepak Vashishth, head of the Department of Biomedical
Engineering at Rensselaer. “Fellowships give our students a
jumpstart on their research career and open up new
opportunities both in academia and the private sector. We
congratulate Sarah and Danielle, and we’re proud to count them
among the growing number of impressive biomedical engineering
graduate students with national and international
fellowships.”
The NSF awards only about 2,000
Graduate Research Fellowship Program awards every year. The
three-year awards include an annual stipend of $30,000 and
educational support of $10,000. The goal of the NSF program is
to help ensure the vitality and diversity of the scientific and
engineering workforce in the United States, by supporting
students who have demonstrated their potential for significant
achievements in science and engineering research.
In the past year, graduate students in the Department of Biomedical
Engineering at Rensselaer have been honored with several
highly competitive and notable fellowships. In addition to
Linley and Bogdanowicz, recent fellowships include:
- Brian Bradke | National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Predoctoral Fellowship
- Lamya Karim | National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Predoctoral Fellowship
- Ondrej Nickels | Embassy of France Chateaubriand
Fellowship
- Rebecca Wachs | American Association of University Women
Dissertation Fellowship
Additionally, biomedical engineering graduate students
Andrew Dias and Sterling Nesbitt received honorable mentions
from the NSF in the 2011 Graduate Research Fellowship Program
Competition.
“Over the past two years, biomedical engineering faculty and
the department have made great efforts to recruit highly
talented graduate students, and arm them with the tools and
skills to be effective, competitive researchers,” Vashishth
said. “We are very proud of the success of our graduate
students, and the growing number of stellar fellowships they’re
winning.”
Biomedical engineering students work closely with their
advisers in the Rensselaer Center for Biotechnology and
Interdisciplinary Studies. Graduate students and faculty in
biomedical engineering regularly collaborate with other
Rensselaer research centers, including the supercomputer Computational Center
for Nanotechnology Innovations, as well as the Center
for Modeling, Simulation, and Imaging in Medicine, Center for Multiscale Science and
Engineering, and several hospitals and medical centers in
New York, Boston, and Connecticut.
For more information on Biomedical Engineering research at
Rensselaer, see:
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Published
May 12,
2011 |
Contact: Michael Mullaney
Phone: (518) 276-6161
E-mail: mullam@rpi.edu |
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