A new grant from the National Science Foundation will give undergraduate students nationwide the opportunity to come to Emory University next summer to build their research skills alongside dedicated faculty mentors.
The highly competitive $400,000 Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) grant will fund training and support for up to nine students in the new Catalyzing Careers in Chemistry initiative each summer for three years.
The program offers students, especially those from colleges and universities without robust research options, the chance to work closely with faculty and their research groups in the Department of Chemistry at Emory College of Arts and Sciences. Available projects span several chemistry subdisciplines, ranging from designing and synthesizing new catalysts for industrially relevant reactions to applying machine learning to predict the properties of anti-cancer compounds.
“Our plan is that the experience at Emory will help more students envision themselves as scientists and we plan to prepare them for graduate school or connect them to industry programs,” says Antonio Brathwaite, the teaching professor of chemistry who is the REU program’s principal investigator (PI).
Brathwaite expects the program to attract talented students to Emory and boost the chemistry department’s ongoing effort to encourage students from diverse backgrounds to consider science careers.
The students selected for the REU will receive a $7,000 stipend for 10 weeks of work, plus on-campus housing and a travel allowance.
They will also have distinct programming as well as opportunities to network and socialize with students in Emory’s Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) program through the Pathways Center’s Undergraduate Research Programs.
“The REU will complement what we are able to offer,” says Cora MacBeth, an associate dean in the College’s Office for Undergraduate Education. “It really highlights the efforts that Emory chemistry has made to increase research experiences and professional development, especially for students from diverse backgrounds, that translate into new career paths.”
Applications, and a program website, will open in November. Several faculty members already have requested to be paired with an REU student, underscoring the department’s enthusiasm for preparing future scientists from all backgrounds.
William Wuest, a chemistry professor and Georgia Research Alliance Distinguished Investigator whose lab has been awarded separate NSF funding, hopes to find a student interested in his research to synthesizing antifungal agents to combat crop damage.
Chemistry professor Simon Blakey is eager to connect with a student interested in how investigating reactions in his organic chemistry lab can accelerate drug discovery.
“This is an amazing opportunity to expand students’ horizons and help them understand ways research contributes to society,” Blakey says. “We want to open those doors for them.”
For Brathwaite, the mission is personal. He first saw research-grade equipment during a field trip from his small undergraduate liberal arts college to the University of Georgia.
The exposure inspired him to pursue a summer research position in a physical chemistry lab at the university, then earn his PhD there.
Brathwaite has since committed himself to encouraging others to embrace research science, a passion that won him the Emory Williams Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award and fueled his desire to establish an REU site in the chemistry department.
“Summer research opened up a whole new world for me,” Brathwaite says. “The REU students who join us at Emory will get the chance to see all the possibilities that lie ahead.”