Murray

Venessa Murray

Two National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowships were awarded to graduate students, Vanessa Murray and Benjamin Schwarz. These highly competitive fellowships sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense are only offered to 200 students every year and provide tuition, fees and stipend support for up to three years. Our Department is fortunate to have two outstanding students selected given the nearly 3000 applications to this fellowship program. Ms. Murray, who is from Craig, Colorado, received her BS in chemical engineering from Montana State University in 2011 and is a PhD student in chemistry working in the laboratory of Professor Tim Minton.  She was highlighted in an April MSU news release. Read her inspiring story..
Schwartz

Benjamin Schwartz

Mr. Schwarz, who is from Bend, Oregon, received his BS in biochemistry from Gonzaga University in 2011.  He is a PhD student in biochemistry working in the laboratory of Regents Professor Trevor Douglas. Mr. Schwarz’s research focuses on developing efficient biomimetic technologies using virus-like particles (VLP) as encapsulation platforms for enzymes.  This strategy sequesters an enzyme in high copy number, avoiding the cost and labor involved in purifying enzymes.  The long term goal of this research is to develop this technology for use as a model for the study of metabolic pathways.  Mr. Schwarz has a publication in this area already and another paper currently under review: Patterson DP, Schwarz B, El-Boubou K, Prevelige P, Douglas T (2012)  “Virus-like Particle Nanoreactors:  Programmed Encapsulation of the Thermostable CelB Glucosidase Inside the P22 Capsid.”Soft Matter, 8, 10158-10166..