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2018 Prizes and Awards Announced

May 11, 2018 By

Congratulations to all recipients of the 2018 prizes and awards for the Division of Science and the departments and programs within the Division.

Division of Science Prizes and Awards

  • Doris Brewer Cohen Award: Richard Haburcak (Math, Chemistry)
  • Rishon M. BIaler ’64 Memorial Prize: Abraham Cheloff (Biology, Neuroscience, Chemistry)
  • Schiff Memorial Award in Science: Meisui Liu (Biology) and Kathryn Shangraw (Biology)
  • Division of Science Prize for Outstanding Research Accomplishment: Heather Schiller (Biology, Neuroscience) and Jordan Saadon (Biology, Neuroscience)
  • Dr. Ralph Berenberg ’65 Prize (dentistry): Brandon Tran
  • Elihu A. Silver Prize (junior research): Julia Tartaglia (Biochemistry)
  • Steinberg Prize (Physical Science with interest in History): Mihir Khanna (Physics, Art History minor)

Biochemistry Prizes and Awards

  • Nathan O. Kaplan Prize in Biochemistry: Jessie Moore (Senior)
  • Professor Dagmar Ringe Biochemistry Award: Miriam Hood (Senior)
  • William P. Jencks Award in Biochemistry: Senmiao Sun (Senior)

Biology Prizes and Awards

  • Biology Department Award For Excellence in Research: Jason Xin
  • Chandler Fulton Prize for Undergraduate Research: Theresa Weis

Chemistry Prizes and Awards

  • Anatol Zhabotinsky Memorial Prize: Sumner Alperin-Lea
  • American Chemical Society Division of Physical Chemistry 2018 Undergraduate Award: Sumner Alperin-Lea
  • Chemistry Department Excellence Award: Samantha Shepherd
  • Melvin M. Snider Prize in Chemistry: Jamie Soohoo
  • American Chemical Society Division of Inorganic Chemistry 2018 Undergraduate Award: Elishua D. Litle
  • American Chemical Society Division of Organic Chemistry 2018 Undergraduate Award: Elishua D. Litle
  • Emily Dudek Undergraduate Teaching Assistant Award: Miriam Hood; Steven Wilhelm

Mathematics Prizes and Awards

  • Jerome Levine Thesis Prize (given annually to a graduate student in mathematics finishing with an outstanding PhD thesis): Yan Zhuang
  • Arnold Shapiro Prize in Mathematics (to a senior who has shown unusual talent and accomplishments in mathematical studies): Richard Haburcak

Neuroscience Prizes and Awards

  • Reis and Sowul Family Prize in Neuroscience: Amanda Shilton
  • John Lisman ’66 Memorial Award for Excellence in Neuroscience Research: Megan Leubner and Casey Lamar

Physics Prizes and Awards

  • Stephan Berko Memorial Prize (This endowed prize was established in 1991 by the family of the late Dr. Berko to annually recognize an outstanding student in Physics): Ali Aghvami (graduate); Carl Merrigan (graduate); Zachary Sustiel (undergraduate)
  • David L. Falkoff Prize (The Falkoff  Prize annually recognizes a graduate student in Physics who demonstrates excellence in teaching): Daichi Hayakawa
  • Physics Faculty Prize (Awarded to a graduating senior for excellence in Physics): Guillermo Narvaez Paliza; Liana Simpson

 

 

Filed Under: awards, Biochemistry, Biology, chemistry, Mathematics, Physics Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Raul Ramos Pays It Forward in His Home State of Texas

May 3, 2018 By


photo credit: Simon Goodacre

Helen Wong | Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

Raul Ramos, a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in Neuroscience, spent the five-hour flight from Boston to Austin, Texas trying to think of what to say to a classroom full of adolescents who had been sentenced to juvenile detention, like he had been once when he was a teenager.

“I was trying to get into the mindset of it all,” he says of those nerve-wracking hours before arriving in Austin. “I was trying to remember how I felt when I had been in their shoes.” He had put together a talk and a script, but the moment he entered the first classroom at the Austin Alternative Learning Center, all of it went out the window. “Instead of giving a lecture, I had an actual conversation with the kids,” says Ramos. “They could relate to me. I was someone who looked like them, talked like them, moved like them. So they listened when I told them about my story and how, despite what they were facing now, their outcomes could be different too.”

Ramos first started working with high school students after he moved to Waltham. Anique Olivier-Mason PhD’12, Director of Education, Outreach and Diversity at the Materials Research Science and Engineering Center had arranged “Pizza Talks,” a program where graduate students in the sciences visit classrooms at Waltham High School and discuss their decisions to pursue careers in science, their experiences as investigators and their research. The program has been a great success and now serves as the model for similar talks taking place nationally, sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Ramos volunteered to give a talk when he first heard about the program.

“Waltham High has a large Hispanic student population,” says Ramos. “These groups underrepresented in science. I really liked going to speak to them and talking about my own journey and its relation to my identity.” AAAS became aware of this community outreach and contacted the university to learn more. Ramos has always been open about the troubles in his own past, so when AAAS were looking for scientists to speak to students in alternative learning centers in Austin, they asked him if he would like to go. “I said yes, of course,” says Ramos. “I’m from Texas originally, so I agreed to fly down and talk to the kids.”

What began as originally just one or two schools became six upon his arrival in Austin as word got around of his visit. During the trip, Ramos gave sixteen talks and spoke to around two hundred students. “I went to juvie centers, alternative learning centers, drug rehabilitation facilities,” he says. “The level of engagement was amazing. For every kid that didn’t want to engage, there were a few more who wanted to talk to me and learn about how I’d gotten to where I am. One of the most frequent questions they asked me was, ‘Sir, what do I do when I get out of here?’ and I would tell them the truth. I told them that once they got out, they would have to actively avoid situations and people that would get them in trouble. I said that if that meant having to hole up in their room to study and get away from it all, then doing that would absolutely be worth it in the long run. Their environment matters.”

But even after telling them his advice, Ramos knew that advice alone wasn’t going to be enough for many of the kids he was speaking to. “You need a support network,” he says. “A lot of these kids don’t have that. Some of them are safer in detention than at home. So many of them are angry–why wouldn’t they be? They’re supposed to become upstanding members of society, but the way the system goes about that is to lock them up and isolate them. That’s not how rehabilitation should work.”

At some of the facilities he visited, Ramos saw kids as young as eleven or twelve being escorted by armed guards from classroom to classroom despite some of them being barely half his size. For Ramos, the sight was jarring. “It looks like overkill,” says Ramos. “I know they’re here because they did something wrong, but at the end of the day, they’re just kids.”

It also struck Ramos, as he made the rounds in each facility, that the kids incarcerated at these centers were all people of color despite Austin being in a majority white part of Texas. “Brandeis is all about recruiting underrepresented minorities into its science programs,” he says. However, the challenges of recruiting students of color for doctoral programs in science are significant, and Ramos realized during his trip to Texas that “part of the reason for the absence of black and brown individuals in science was that so many of them, who could potentially be scientists someday, are stuck in juvie–stuck in environments that deprive them of opportunities and healthy role models.

“And people like me that manage to get an education, we make it out and we leave. We come over here to go to college, we leave Laredo [Ramos’ hometown], and these kids don’t get to have good role models. They make mistakes fueled by a terrible home environment and get stuck in the juvie-to-prison pipeline. They repent and feel bad in juvie, but once they get out, if they don’t have a support network, it starts all over again. The system tries them as full adults at seventeen, when they’re not even old enough to vote. Things have to change. I want to help make that happen and to show them that right now, there are still opportunities open to them.”

Despite all of the system’s shortcomings, the alternative learning centers and similar institutions are making a tangible difference. “The system’s not perfect,” says Ramos. “It’s deeply flawed. But things are already better now than when I was in. Back then, I was put in what would conventionally be considered a prison cell. At least most of these kids get an education, space to walk, and are surrounded by people who care about them. Everyone working at the Austin Alternative Learning Center was so motivated and clearly cared about the kids.”

Upon his return to Brandeis, Ramos decided that he would dedicate more time to community outreach and consider the possibility of working in science policy after earning his doctorate. He wants to do work that not only has value in the scientific world, but that also actively helps bolster diversity and inclusion in the field, helping fight back against larger societal and institutional structures that disadvantage people of color.

“We need representation to show kids that the journey is possible,” says Ramos. “The cards feel like they’re stacked almost the entire way through. I’m going to do whatever I have to do to get the message out there to those kids who are hardest to reach and who need to hear from us the most.”

Filed Under: labs, Neuroscience Tagged With: , ,

Brandeisians Receive 2018 NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

April 9, 2018 By

NSF Graduate Research FellowshipFive Brandeisians (past and present) have received NSF Graduate Research Fellowships for 2018. Also, one current graduate student received an honorable mention.

This program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported STEM disciplines who are pursuing research-based advanced degrees at U.S. institutions. In 2018, the National Science Foundation (NSF) received over 12,000 applications, and made 2,000 award offers. This fellowship provides three years of financial support within a five-year fellowship period ($34,000 annual stipend and $12,000 cost-of-education allowance to the graduate institution).

Alyssa Garcia, a Brandeis Physics graduate student, received a fellowship. Marcelle Soares-Santos, Assistant Professor of Physics, is Alyssa’s advisor. Marcelle said “Alyssa will work on obtaining a sample of neutron star collisions with the goal of using them as standard sirens to determine the rate of expansion of the Universe.  This is very timely after the discovery of the groundbreaking neutron star collision GW170817 as the gravitational wave detectors are now being upgraded and when they come back later this year, they are expected to yield almost 10 times more detection’s per year. That wealth of data, is a very exciting prospect for a student starting their PhD career!”

Christopher Konow, a Ph.D. candidate in Chemistry, received an honorable mention. He works in the Irving Epstein lab analyzing the Turing Pattern formation in Growing Domains using the CDIMA (chlorine dioxide-iodine-malonic acid) chemical reaction.  For the NSF GRF, he proposed developing a novel self-oscillating hydrogel that could have uses in drug delivery.  He plans to start this project in late summer/early fall of 2018.

The Brandeis undergraduate alumni receiving 2018 NSF GR fellowships are:

  • Caroline Cappello graduated in 2011 with a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies and Theater Arts. She is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Biology at the University of Washington.
  • Emma Chad-Friedman received a BA in Psychology and Anthropology in 2014 and is in the PhD. Psychology program at the University of Maryland at College Park.
  • Jung Park also graduated in 2014 with a degree in Neuroscience and Psychology. He is currently a Ph.D. student in Neurobiology and Behavior at Columbia University.
  • Stanislav Popov received his B.S. degree in Mathematics and Chemistry only 2 years ago (2016). While at Brandeis, Stanislav worked in Isaac Krauss’ lab. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in Chemistry at UCLA.
Filed Under: awards, Biology, chemistry, labs, Mathematics, Neuroscience, Physics, Psychology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Jonathan Touboul is new Associate Professor in Mathematics

January 29, 2018 By

Jonathan Touboul is a new associate professor in the Department of Mathematics. He is also associated to the Neuroscience program, and member of the Volen National Center for Complex Systems. His research deals with mathematical equations modeling the behavior of neurons and networks of the brain. He is also interested in understanding how the brain is interconnected and if or how these interconnection patterns play a role information processing, learning and memory.

Prior to joining Brandeis, Jonathan Touboul led for a research team at Collège de France in Paris, within the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Biology. He received his PhD in Mathematics from École Polytechnique (Paris) and spent some time as a postdoc at Pittsburgh University with Bard Ermentrout and at the Rockefeller University with Marcelo Magnasco.

At Brandeis, he intends to pursue his researches in models of large-scale neural networks, learning, memory and synchronized oscillations in Parkinson’s disease.

Filed Under: Mathematics, Neuroscience Tagged With: , ,

Neuroscience Faculty Members Named AAAS Fellows

November 20, 2017 By
Leslie Griffith & Gina Turrigiano-2017 AAAS Fellows

Leslie Griffith (left) and Gina Turrigiano (right)

Leslie Griffith and Gina Turrigiano have been named American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Fellows for 2017. This is in recognition of their contributions and scientific leadership in the field of Neuroscience.

Leslie Griffith, Nancy Lurie Marks Professor of Neuroscience and Director of the Volen Center for Complex Systems, studies sleep and memory using Drosophila melanogaster.

Gina Turrigiano is the Joseph Levitan Professor of Vision Science. Her lab studies the mechanisms of homeostatic synaptic plasticity and their effects in developing and functioning cortex.

Vice Provost for Research Edward Hackett is also a 2017 AAAS Fellow in the Section on History and Philosophy in Science.

Griffith, Turrigiano, Hackett and the other Fellows for 2017 will be recognized on Saturday, Feb. 17, 2018 at the 2018 AAAS Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas.

Read more at BrandeisNow.

Filed Under: awards, labs, Neuroscience Tagged With: , , , , , ,

John Lisman (1944-2017)

October 21, 2017 By

Chair of Biology Piali Sengupta wrote:

It is with great sadness that I am writing to let you know that John Lisman passed away last night. He passed away peacefully surrounded by his family. John was an influential and creative scientist and a very good friend to all of us in Biology and Neuroscience. We are glad that we had the opportunity to honor him and hear from him at the Volen Retreat last week. He will be much missed.

John’s talk at the Volen Retreat earlier this month, delivered by video conference, is available here: The critical role of CaMKII in memory storage: 6 key physiological and behavioral tests

The family has asked that in lieu of flowers people consider contributing to the John Lisman Memorial Scholarship

Earlier tweets from past students and colleagues:

We also received this longer tribute from Michael Kahana:

I was greatly saddened to hear the news that John Lisman passed away this weekend. I spoke with him just a few weeks ago and was greatly looking forward to his upcoming visit to Penn. Although he told me of his illness, I was hoping to have a little more time with my good colleague and friend. Upon learning of his passing, I wanted to write down a few memories to share with friends and colleagues who knew John well.

I vividly recall when I first met John, at an evening gathering at his home that I attended just prior to joining the faculty at Brandeis (this may have been a precursor to the famous Boston Hippocampus meetings that John helped organize). The meeting was teaming with energy, and John welcomed me warmly, introducing me to other scientists in the room. John had recently become very interested in human memory, and as a newly minted PhD working on memory, John took me under his wings, teaching me about neurophysiology and quizzing me enthusiastically about the psychology of memory, a field that John was keen to master as quickly as possible.

John was a polymath, bursting with creative energy, and capable of seeing connections between diverse fields. Over the subsequent decade at Brandeis, John had an enormous influence on my career and research direction, introducing me to theta and gamma rhythms, and teaching me about countless topics in neurophysiology. On a typical day in the Volen Center, John would rush into my lab eager to share a new discovery or ask me a question about a study of memory that he had just learned about. He had this incredibly-infectious scientific curiosity, and he was always abundantly generous with his time, both with me and my students.

I particularly remember the early days when John was developing the LIJ (Lisman-Idiart-Jensen) model, and trying to learn as much as he could about the Sternberg task and other related phenomena in the field of human memory. Although I frequently challenged John on this front, he kept at it, continuing to refine the model together with Ole Jensen until they were able to answer many of the most serious objections. I just saw that the original paper was cited more than 1,200 times, and several of the follow up papers are well into the many hundreds of citations. This is arguably the most creative neurophysiological model of a cognitive function, and the best example of an attempt to link detailed physiological measurements to behavioral measures of human memory.

We have all lost a great friend, colleague, and mentor, and the field of neuroscience has lost one of its shining stars. I want to share my deepest sympathies with all of you who knew and loved John.

May his family be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.
Mike Kahana

Thomas Reese shared his thoughts:

John, your intellect and spirit lighted more than 30 summers my life at the MBL in Woods Hole.  You were a reference point for neurobiology there, holding court at your favorite table at the Kidd, at the far end of the dock.  A cherished invitation to lunch at exactly 12:00, with interesting synapse people passing though, or to hear a deluge of you new ideas about how a synapse is, or should be, put together.  Occasionally an invitation to dinner outside, behind your house with talk of many things…..joined by the delightful Natashia and other interesting people….discussing well into the night.

If Woods Hole is a little scientific Athens, you were our Socrates, lurking on Milfield. questioning in your disarming, open open way…bringing out the truth.  You were our Dogenes. searching Gardner Road for a man with the honest truth.

John, ,…John..it will seem empty there without you…you
will be very much missed..Tom Reese.     NIH

Filed Under: Biology, Neuroscience Tagged With: , , , ,

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