UT Southwestern Ph.D. candidate Mingjian Du has always enjoyed science and research for the sole purpose of helping people. Now, just one year away from graduation, Mr. Du is receiving the highest honor bestowed by the UT Southwestern Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences – the Nominata Award. To read more about Mingjian Du, visit this Center Times Plus story.

---

Transcript

- I grew up from a small city in northwest of China. My parents are farmers. My mom told me that science is all around us and science is everywhere in our daily life. And I got the encouragement from my mom. I went to Tsinghua University for college, in Beijing. And then after college, I came to UT Southwestern for PhD study. I choose UT Southwestern because it is one of the top graduate schools all over the world with its international reputation for biological research. The platform and resources in UT Southwestern allowed me to do the state of art research. My mentor, Dr. Chen, is one of the best scientists in studying cell pathways using the traditional chemical approaches. It feels great to work around with smart people. I enjoy the environment to work as a group and solidify my confidence to do biological research.

- It was really exciting to see that Mingjian has won the Nominata Award. It's the highest honor given to a graduate student at UT Southwestern, and the recipient of this award will deliver a university lecture to the entire campus. He really embodies all the sort of highest quality of a graduate student.

- It's such an incredible honor to receive this award and to share my research in the university lectures.

- [Dr.Chen] Mingjian discovered new mechanism by which immune response is triggered.

- It feels great to be a scientist. I have the freedom to choose the directions of what I want to study. And I'm keeping inventing myself every day. I'm doing something good to people. And what I studied will help and benefit people.