UH College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics
Fall 2011
NSM Pride: Awards and Honors

Share News of Your Achievements

NSM is proud of the achievements of our outstanding alumni, students, faculty and staff. Submit news of your awards and honors to breakthrough@nsm.uh.edu or contact Kathy Major at ksmajor@uh.edu or 713-743-4023.

Alumni

Yemi Adesokan (’01, B.S. Biology) was selected by Technology Review magazine as a TR35 Honoree for 2011. The TR35 recognizes the world’s top innovators under the age of 35, spanning energy, medicine, computing, communications, nanotechnology and other emerging fields. Adesokan, CEO of Pathogenica, Inc., has been honored for his work in the application of next-generation sequencing to clinical diagnostics. He co-founded Pathogenica with genomics pioneer and Harvard professor George Church in 2009 to commercialize applications of pathogen sequencing.

Corey Henderson (’10, B.S. Physics and Mathematics) and Matthew Reichl (’11, B.S. Mathematics and Physics and member of The Honors College) were named 2011 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellows. Henderson is a graduate student at University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Riechl is pursuing a Ph.D. in physics at Cornell University.

Congratulations to NSM Co-Valedictorians for May 2011 Commencement – Sonia E. Henriquez (’11, B.S. Biology) and Betty La (’11, B.S. Biology). Henriquez and La are pursuing degrees in dentistry and medicine, respectively.

Students

Goldwater Scholars: Nicholas Eastham (Senior, Chemistry) and Thomas Markovich (Senior, Physics and Mathematics) were named Barry M. Goldwater Scholars for the 2011-2012 academic year. Mason Biamonte (Senior, Physics and Mathematics) and Abdulrahman Ibrahim (Senior, Chemistry) received honorable mentions. The award, one of the most prestigious available to undergraduate students, provides funding to students majoring in mathematics, the natural sciences or engineering who plan to pursue a career in research.

Rose Feinstein (Master’s Student, Geology) received the Association for Women Geoscientists Brunton Award. At UH, Feinstein is concentrating on the effects of land use and climate change on Quaternary stream morphology.

Faculty and Staff

Rigoberto Advincula (Professor, Chemistry) has been named a Fellow in two technical divisions of the American Chemical Society – the Polymer Chemistry Division and the Polymer Materials Science and Engineering Division.

Suncica “Sunny” Canic (Cullen Distinguished Professor, Mathematics) is serving as a member of the NIH’s Modeling and Analysis of Biological Systems Study Section, Center for Scientific Review. Her four-year term runs from July 2011 until June 2015.

Anne Delcour (Professor, Biology and Biochemistry) stepped into her new role as Associate Dean for Graduate Sciences for NSM in June. Delcour is also the recipient of NSM’s John C. Butler Excellence in Teaching Award.

Roland Glowinski (Cullen Distinguished Professor, Mathematics) received the 2011 Computational Fluid Dynamics Award from the U.S. Association for Computational Mechanics. Glowinski’s award citation acknowledges his “outstanding contributions to establish computational mathematics for variational inequalities, extended domain methods, and others that enhanced computational fluid dynamics worldwide."

Humboldt Research Award Winner: Dan Graur (Moores Professor, Biology and Biochemistry) won the prestigious Humboldt Research Award for life achievements. Graur, the only winner from Houston, won the award in evolutionary biology. The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, a German institute that supports scientific research and awards highly coveted fellowships and prizes, annually recognizes a variety of scientific disciplines.

Jan-Åke Gustafsson (Director, Center for Nuclear Receptors and Cell Signaling, and Welch Professor, Biology and Biochemistry) was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Turku in Finland. Gustafsson was also invited to present the lecture, “Steroid Receptors and Cancer,” in which he detailed the impact of his research on cancer treatment and prevention.

Alex Ignatiev (Director, Center for Advanced Materials, and Professor, Physics) is a newly elected member of the Kazakhstan National Academy of Sciences. The Academy recognized Ignatiev for his long-standing work in materials research and thin film science with specific acknowledgment of his recent efforts in alternative energy technologies for the future including fuel cells, solar cells and energy from space.

Sloan Research Fellow: Vassiliy Lubchenko (Assistant Professor, Chemistry) was selected as a 2011 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow. Sloan Research Fellowships stimulate fundamental research by early-career scientists and scholars of outstanding promise. The two-year fellowships are awarded yearly to 118 researchers in recognition of distinguished performance and a unique potential to make substantial contributions to their field. A theoretical physical chemist, Lubchenko was one of only four recipients from Texas.

Fred McGhee (Executive Director College/Division Operations) received the 2011 Charles F. McElhinney Distinguished Service Award, UH’s highest staff honor.

The research of Ognjen Miljanić (Assistant Professor, Chemistry) was featured in the Research Highlights section of the September 2011 issue of Nature Chemistry. Under the heading Dynamic Covalent Chemistry “Simple Sorting Solution,” the highlight summarized Miljanić’s recent work published in Angewandte Chemie entitled “Self-Sorting of Dynamic Imine Libraries during Distillation.”

The American Chemical Society recognized Mamie Moy (Professor, Chemistry) for her determination to encourage students, especially young women, to pursue careers in the physical sciences. Moy received the organization’s Award for Encouraging Women into Careers in the Chemical Sciences.

Shishir Shah (Associate Professor, Computer Science) received NSM’s John C. Butler Excellence in Teaching Award.

UH Provost-Sponsored Faculty Awards: Four NSM faculty members were honored by UH for advising and teaching excellence. NSM award recipients include:

  • Donna W. Stokes (Associate Professor, Physics), Provost Faculty Advising Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Academic Advising
  • Dan Wells (Chair and Professor, Biology and Biochemistry), Teaching Excellence Award Career Award
  • Michael Murphy (Associate Professor, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences), Teaching Excellence Award Provost Core Award
  • Simon Bott (Instructional Professor, Chemistry), Teaching Excellence Award Instructional/Clinical Award.
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