NSE’s Shaner wins Heller Entrepreneurship Grant
NSE graduate student Sam Shaner was one of four students recently awarded the Ronald I. Heller Entrepreneurship Grant by MIT through the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship.
The Ronald I. Heller Entrepreneurship Grant is presented annually to a MIT student or group of students for their significant impact on the quality and overall spirit of entrepreneurship at the Institute, working closely with the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship, and for their leadership and entrepreneurial fervor in introducing more students to entrepreneurship.
Shaner is a PhD student in Nuclear Science & Engineering at MIT and a DOE NEUP Fellow. He currently serves as co-managing director of the MIT Clean Energy Prize (CEP) and is a director of the Harvard Cooperative Society, and was a co-director of the Nuclear Energy Innovation Summit at the 2013 ANS Student Conference. Last year Shaner was a semi-finalist in the 2012 MIT Clean Energy Prize with a startup developing an novel artificial photosynthesis technology to directly convert sunlight, CO2, and water to liquid hydrocarbon fuels.
As co-managing director of the 2013 MIT Clean Energy Prize Shaner helped strengthen the interaction between budding student entrepreneurs and industry experts by organizing VC/energy entrepreneur meet-ups, expanded the prize purse from $270,000 to $320,000 by recruiting additional sponsors, doubled the number of competition applicants, and openied up the competition to a wider array of clean energy technologies.
Before coming to MIT Shaner received a BS in Chemical Engineering from UCSB (graduating first in the College of Engineering class of 2011) where he performed research on the design, synthesis, and testing of nano-structured inorganic materials for hydrocarbon catalysis in collaboration with industrial partners including Corning Inc. and Gas Reaction Technologies Inc.
The other three Heller winners in 2013 are undergraduates Heidi Baumgartner (Physics) and Nikita Khlystov (Chemical Engineering with a Minor in Materials Science and Engineering ) and MBA student Anya Priester.
Related
- NSE-led UPower wins category in MIT Clean Energy Prize, is finalist in MIT 100K competition
- NSE graduate students Black, Boyd, Shaner win NEUP Fellowships
Photo: Vanessa Marcoux/Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship
Photo l to r: Bill Aulet, managing director, Martin Trust Center; Sam Shaner, Heidi Baumgartner, Anya Priester, Nikita Khlystov, Professor Ed Roberts, founder and chair, Martin Trust Center
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