Samueli School Students Receive Graduate Research Fellowship Program Awards

Pair of students receive awards

The Henry Samueli School of Engineering is pleased to recognize two students who have been awarded offers by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) in recognition of their outstanding research and academic accomplishments.

The NSF GRFP helps ensure the vitality of the human resource base of science and engineering in the United States and reinforces its diversity. The program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based M.S. and Ph.D. degrees at accredited United States institutions.

Iris Fu is a second-year graduate student working with Assistant Professor Hung D. Nguyen, Ph.D., in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science. Her research focuses on elucidating detailed molecular-level mechanisms by which peptide amphiphiles (conjugated molecules containing both polymeric and peptide domains) are self-assembled into nanostructures for hydrogel for tissue engineering or encapsulating nanoparticles for gene delivery. By performing molecular dynamics simulations, which often serve as powerful and complementary tools to assembly-kinetics experiments and theoretical calculations, she hopes to provide valuable insights into the whole self-assembly process by peptide amphiphiles. 

Meiting Wu is a fourth-year undergraduate student with double-majors in mechanical engineering and material science engineering. She will be pursuing her Ph.D. in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. She started her first undergraduate research at the end of her freshman year at UC Irvine in the lab of Assistant Professor Matt Law, Ph.D., on the synthesis of complex nanocrystalline materials. These were utilized for the p-type photoelectrode of a tandem dye-sensitized water splitting solar cell. In the summer of her junior year, she participated in an eight-week research internship for the Center of Integrated Nanomechanical Systems (COINS) program at UC Berkeley to help develop colloidal nanoparticles to improve the next generation of high-efficient and low-cost solar cells in the lab of Professor Paul Alivisatos, Ph.D. Her goal during her two undergraduate research opportunities was to develop nanotechnology that promotes renewable energy sources. In graduate school, she will be pursuing research either in the field of solid mechanics or microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) at UC Berkeley.