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Thinking Ahead: Summer & Beyond
While the summer session has just recently begun, the fall term is right around the corner. Along with some news items from the spring, here are a few things to keep in mind as you and your UROP students plan ahead for the fall.
Outstanding UROP Mentor Award Announced
The Outstanding UROP Mentor Award, awarded each spring, recognizes both a student research mentor and a faculty research mentor who demonstrated exceptional guidance and teaching undergraduates within a research setting though the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP). This year’s recipients were:
- Prof. Jeffrey Karp, an HST affiliated Faculty member, who serves as an Instructor in Medicine and Health Sciences and Technology at Harvard Medical School and the Brigham & Women's Hospital. He also serves as Director of the Laboratory for Advanced Biomaterials and Stem-Cell-Based Therapeutics at Brigham & Women's Hospital and has actively supervised UROP students since summer 2007. According to one of his nominators, “Dr. Karp is very helpful and provides exceptional guidance for the UROP research I am doing. He is particularly understanding of time commitments, especially with schoolwork.”
- Dr. David Nguyen, a 2008 doctoral student in Health Sciences & Technology, who was an active undergraduate researcher himself while an undergraduate at MIT and a UROP mentor through his graduate years. According to one of his nominators, he dedicates “time regularly during the week to ensure that [his UROPs] understand the goals behind each experiment.” Furthermore,
he “is always available” and “is a great personal mentor” whose UROP students attribute “much of their life's success at the moment” to “his help and dedication."
2008 Peter J. Eloranta Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships Announced
The Peter J. Eloranta Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships are awarded to MIT undergraduates for interesting and novel research of student-initiated ideas developed outside the normal curriculum. Each fellowship provides $6,000 for the students to conduct their summer research in any field. This year’s recipients and their projects selected by the Eloranta Fellowship Committee are:
- Emilienne Repak, ’09 - The Pied Piper of the Peripheral Nervous System: Comparing Guidance Cues for Directing Neuronal Growth
- Shane W. Colton, '08 - Realization of a Scale Electric Vehicle with Capacitive Regeneration and Launch Assist
- Lynne Tye, '10 - The Role of Dopamine in the Formation of Emotional Memories
- Alec Resnick, '08 and Sarah Ackley, '08 - Design and Construction of a Low-Cost, Educational NMR Kit
- David Reshef, '08 - Computational and Visual Approach to Understanding the Vibrio Cholera Epidemic
- Jessica Schirmer, '08 - 'The Words to Say It': Narratives of Class Transition
2008 Randolph G. Wei Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Research
The Randolph G. Wei UROP Award is presented each spring to the undergraduate who has made the most outstanding contribution in undergraduate research at the interface of the life sciences and engineering. This year, the Committee selected Alice Macdonald, ’08. Alice has been conducting UROP research with Prof. Lauffenburger, Professor of Biological Engineering, since spring 2007 and this collaboration has led to a first-author journal publication and upcoming presentation of her work. Alice will conduct research this summer in Paris before beginning a PhD program in bioengineering.
IROP Projects Increase for Summer 2008
The UAAP reports that thirty-two undergraduates plan to conduct UROP research overseas this summer. This is a significant increase over summer 2007, where twelve students were engaged in internationally-based UROP projects (known as “IROP”).
Summer 2008 IROP projects will cover a wide spectrum of research areas, from plant biology in Bangkok, to facial recognition studies in Israel. Other IROP destinations include: Canada, Costa Rica, England, France, Germany, India, Italy, Mauritius, Mexico, the Netherlands, Singapore, Sweden, and Switzerland. Regardless of research location, all IROP students are mentored by MIT faculty.
More information on IROP can be found on the UROP web page: http://mit.edu/urop/guides/uropoverseas.html. Faculty interested in supervising students on overseas research are encouraged to contact UROP staff at urop@mit.edu.
Upcoming UROP Deadlines
UROP deadlines for the 2008-2009 academic year have been set. As you are aware, the UROP proposal process is now online, so your students must initiate their UROP applications no later than 5 pm on the following dates:
- Fall Direct Funding Deadline: September 11, 2008
- Fall Supervisor Funding, Credit & Volunteer Deadline: October 30, 2008
- IAP Supervisor Funding, Credit & Volunteer Deadline: January 8, 2009 (NOTE: IAP is not a UROP Direct Funding period)
- Spring Direct Funding Deadline: February 12, 2009
- Spring Supervisor Funding, Credit & Volunteer Deadline: March 26, 2009
- Summer Direct Funding Deadline: April 16, 2009
- Summer Supervisor Funding, Credit & Volunteer Deadline: June 25, 2009
As a supervisor, you will have additional time to review your students' submissions and will receive email from UROP staff when proposals await your review.
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