HHMI awards 2014 international fellowships to three graduate students
By Deborah Wormser
Three students in the UT Southwestern Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences have received prestigious 2014 International Student Research Fellowships from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
The three fellowships are among 46 awarded to students from 24 countries. The program, established in 2011, provides $43,000 in annual support for students during their third through fifth year of graduate school in the U.S.
Because having Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigators on campus was a prerequisite for nomination, 56 Ph.D.-granting institutions were eligible and 322 students submitted applications.
The UT Southwestern awardees are:
- Liem Nguyen – the HHMI’s first Fellow from Vietnam – who is conducting cancer research mentored by Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine and of Pediatrics Dr. Hao Zhu, whose laboratory is in the Children’s Medical Center Research Institute at UT Southwestern;
- Chensu Wang, of China, who is a joint student under Professor of Pharmacology Dr. Jinming Gao, of the Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Professor of Cell Biology Dr. Michael White. She earned an undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering in China. Her project uses novel nanoprobes to investigate the signaling and metabolism of lysosomes in living cells; and
- Xiaolei Shi, of China, for research into metabolic predictors of melanoma metastasis in a project mentored by Dr. Ralph DeBerardinis, Associate Professor in the Children's Medical Center Research Institute, with secondary appointments in the Department of Pediatrics and the Eugene McDermott Center for Human Growth & Development.
In related news, the American Society for Cell Biology selected 2013 HHMI International Research Fellowship awardee Jiaxi Wu for third place in its Kaluza Prize competition, which honors outstanding and original graduate achievements in basic research presented at the society’s annual meeting. He is mentored by Professor of Molecular Biology Dr. Zhijian “James” Chen, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator who has a secondary appointment in the Center for the Genetics of Host Defense. Mr. Wu also received the 2014 Nominata Award, the highest honor bestowed upon a graduate student by the UT Southwestern Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.
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Dr. Chen holds the George L. MacGregor Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Science.
Dr. Deberardinis holds the Joel B. Steinberg, M.D. Chair in Pediatrics, and is a Sowell Family Scholar in Medical Research.
Dr. White holds the Grant A. Dove Distinguished Chair for Research in Oncology, and the Sherry Wigley Crow Cancer Research Endowed Chair in Honor of Robert Lewis Kirby, M.D.
