Five CCSNH Students Awarded NH BioMade Research Fellowships
Five Community College of New Hampshire (CCSNH) students have been selected for the NH BioMade (Undergraduate Research Training (URT) program. Four have accepted and will spend the summer conducting biomaterials-related research.
Manchester Community College (MCC) student Gwendolyn Tupman, along with Great Bay Community College (GBCC) students Nick Mixon, Mason Jacques and April Weeks will receive $600 per week in grant funding to work with a faculty mentor as a member of a research team. This is the fourth year that CCSNH students have been invited to participate in the NH BioMade program, which explores a pathway to the rapidly growing, high wage biomanufacturing workforce.
“These are particularly powerful experiences for recent CCSNH graduates, boosting their scientific skills and knowledge in the summer just prior to transfer,” said Dr. Leslie Barber, GBCC professor of biological science and CCSNH faculty fellow. “By choosing a research experience at the institution they plan to attend, students can also build connections with faculty and other students. Time and time again, we have seen how these prior connections ease the transfer experience and contribute to later student success. But whether transferring or returning to CCSNH to complete their degree, all of our participants benefit from the boost of confidence and insight that comes from this experience with professional scientific research.”
The New Hampshire Center for Multiscale Modeling and Manufacturing of Biomaterials (NH BioMade) program is led by UNH, in partnership with Dartmouth College, CCSNH, Keene State College and UNH-Manchester. Its goal is to advance the design and manufacture of biomaterials and develop the knowledge to predict and control their composition, structure, properties, and function. Accomplished through a “model, make and measure” systems-level approach to research, NH BioMade supports New Hampshire’s biomaterials industry through knowledge generation, academic-industrial research partnerships, and workforce development, enabling rapid advancement in biomaterials design and manufacturing. Biomaterials, such as those used in implants and tissue engineering are the focus for NH BioMade research in areas of composites for orthopedics, sheet metal for trauma fixation, scaffolds for tissue regeneration and structures for biosensor applications.
Gwendolyn Tupman, from Pembroke and a recent graduate of MCC with an associate degree in Life Sciences, will be working with Linqing Li, assistant professor of chemical engineering at UNH on the “Developing a Vascularized 3D Tumor Model to Screen Drugs for Cancer Treatment” project. Tupman will be transferring to UNH Manchester in the fall, to study Biotechnology.
In addition to the URT program, transferring CCSNH students are eligible to apply for $10,000 in scholarship funding ($5000/year for up to two years) to complete a baccalaureate degree in a major that relates directly to the research objectives of NH BioMade.
NH BioMade is funded through the National Science Foundation’s Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR). In previous years many of the CCSNH URT students have gone on to be awarded transfer scholarships to continue their education.
