Two GRS Ph.D. candidates, Jamie Kendall in Earth & Environment and Katherine Zhao in Computer Science, have won Clare Boothe Luce Graduate Fellowships for 2013-15. Each year BU provides the graduate fellowships—which include tuition, fees, and a stipend—to promising young scientists. In addition to the two graduate students, four CAS undergrads (as well as one ENG undergrad who is mentored by a CAS professor) were named Clare Boothe Luce Undergraduate Research Scholars. Read more
In her research, Kendall (whose advisor is Associate Professor Ethan Baxter) will use isotope geochemistry and thermodynamic analysis to reconstruct the timing and fluxes of the ancient geologic water cycle preserved in rocks on the island of Syros, Greece. These rocks (which she will sample as part of an international team of collaborators in 2014) are from a 45 million year old subduction zone where water was carried into the deep earth, then released to create volcanoes and earthquakes similar to those occurring a major subduction zones today. By reconstructing the dehydration history preserved in these rocks, she will test hypotheses about the subduction zone water cycle including whether dehydration was slow and steady, or more pulsed in nature. Her work will be performed in the BU TIMS Facility (www.bu.edu/tims) and is funded by a National Science Foundation grant.
Zhao is pursuing a novel approach to constructing future computer systems. Her approach marries traditional logic with biologically inspired mechanisms. In particular, she is working on representing the operation of a computer system in a manner that permits patterns in its behavior to be revealed, quantified and automatically learned. These results will be the building blocks for new computer systems that can automatically improve their operation based on “experience” and are amenable to leveraging the burgeoning advances in ‘neuromophic’ hardware—very low-power electronic analog circuits that mimic neuro-biological architectures and function. She graduated with a BA/MA in Computer Science at BU in 2012.
The Clare Boothe Luce Undergraduate Research Scholars are: Julie Hammond (sophomore, Physics, advisor: Richard Averitt (Physics)); Emma Rosenfeld (junior, Mathematics and Physics, advisor: Steve Ahlen (Physics)); Isabela Haghighi (sophomore, Mechanical Engineering (ENG), advisor: Bennett Goldberg (Physics)); Megan Audet (junior, Chemistry, advisor: John Snyder (Chemistry)); and Chloe Wendell (sophomore, Linguistics and Chemistry, advisor: James Panek (Chemistry)). The undergraduate scholars receive small grants.
Hammond’s project is titled “The Effect of Ultra-Fast Voltage on the Isotropic to Nematic Phase Transition of a Liquid Crystal.” She is working on “liquid crystal” technology. This research is important because many computer imaging devices (laptop screens, digital watches, etc) use liquid crytals for generating the image.
Rosenfeld’s project is titled “Development of Micromegas Muon Chambers for the ATLAS New Small Wheel Upgrade.” She is working on a project related to the Higgs Boson particle, with collaborations with the Large Hadron Collider. She is developing devices that will improve detection of muons (elemental particles).
Haghighi’s project is titled “Graphene Drumhead Strain.” She will be conducting research to improve the properties of graphene, a single-layered carbon material that can be used as a resonance detector, which has many industrial applications.
Audet’s project is titled “Intramolecular Cobalt-Catalyzed [2+2+2] Cyclizations of Bisnitriles for the Preparation of Unique Small Molecule Libraries.” She is developing methods in organic chemistry for the creation of new small-molecule libraries, which could be screened for biological properties.
Wendell’s project is titled “Synthesis and Biological Evaluation of Myxopyronin A and Conformationally Restricted Analogs as Inhibitors of Bacterial RNA Polymerase.” She is using chemical methods to synthesize the natural product Myxopyronin A, a compound that may have antibiotic properties.