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(Reno, Nev.) –
Producing highly-qualified professionals, including scientists,
engineers and entrepreneurs is critical to maintaining economic
productivity in the United States. Public discourse on our nation’s
competitiveness tends to focus on the needs of low-performing students.
As important to our country’s future success are the most capable of
students, who are reaching high levels of academic excellence and, if
given the proper support, can help propel the United States forward in
an ever-competitive world.
Among these high achievers, 20 bright young people named as 2014 Davidson Fellows exemplify the extraordinary work that can be accomplished by U.S. students who are given opportunities to excel. The Class of 2014 includes eight students from California, two siblings of past Davidson Fellows, a young woman whose project was inspired by her own experience with a rare pediatric liver cancer, as well as a young man who created a high efficiency extraction method of oil from the algae that makes algae biodiesel production an economic viability..
The Davidson Fellows program
offers $50,000, $25,000 and $10,000 college scholarships to students 18
or younger, who have created significant projects that have the
potential to benefit society in the fields of science, technology,
mathematics, literature, music and philosophy. The Davidson Fellows
scholarship program has provided more than $5.8 million in scholarship
funds to 246 Fellows since its inception in 2001, and has been named one
of the most prestigious undergraduate scholarships by
U.S. News & World Report.
The Davidson Fellows Scholarship is a program of the
Davidson Institute for Talent
Development, a national nonprofit organization headquartered in Reno,
Nev. that supports profoundly gifted youth.
“The Davidson Institute is built on the belief that
individuals, who have extraordinary intelligence and talents, when
encouraged and supported, can improve the quality of life for us all,”
said Bob Davidson, co-founder of the Davidson Institute. “We are
delighted to recognize this group of resourceful and distinguished young
people for their fascinating projects – projects that have the potential
to benefit society.”
Positive contributions to society made by the 2014 Davidson
Fellows include:
- Developing insights into the complexities of cognitive function
and dysfunction, extending our understanding of human perception and
potentially leading to cures for neural pathologies such as
Parkinson’s disease.
- Developing new influenza inhibitors to a number of flu
targets, which show promise for development into real medicine or
even a combination therapy, which could prevent viral resistance.
- Creating a blood-testing device for the early diagnosis of
cancers and insight into individualized treatment of cancers.
- Developing
low-cost wearable sensors for real-time, reliable detection of
dementia patients’ wanderings out of bed.
The 2014 Davidson Fellows Award Ceremony is scheduled for
Fri., Sept. 26 in Washington, D.C. with all scholarship recipients attending.
2014 Davidson Fellow Laureates
$50,000 Scholarships
- Mr. Ravi Jagadeesan, 18, Naperville, Ill.; A
New Galois Invariant of Dessins d’Enfants
- Miss Sara Kornfeld Simpson, 17, San
Diego; Neuronal Nonlinear Dynamics: From an Optical Illusion to
Parkinson’s Disease
- Mr. Ray Ushikubo, 13, Riverside, Calif.;
Circle of Life in Music
- Miss Alice Zhai, 16, La Canada, Calif.;
Dependency of U.S. Hurricane Loss on Maximum Wind Speed and Storm
Size
2014 Davidson Fellows
$25,000 Scholarships
- Mr. Eric Chen, 18, San Diego; Computer-Aided
Discovery of Novel Anti-Flu Drug Candidates to Fight Pandemics
- Mr. Neil Davey, 18, Gaithersburg, Md.;
Early Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment Through the Detection of
Circulating Tumor Cells Using Drop-Based Microfluidics
- Miss Valerie Ding, 17, Portland, Ore.;
Novel Next-Generation Multijunction Quantum Dot Solar Panel
Designs Using Monte Carlo Based Modeling
- Miss Alexandra LaGrassa, 17, Douglastown,
N.Y.; Using Ligands to Control the Growth of Cadmium Selenide
Clusters
- Mr. Ritesh Ragavender, 17, Kendall Park,
N.J.; Odd Dunkl Operators and nilHecke Algebras
- Mr. Kenneth Shinozuka, 15, New York;
Wearable Sensors: A Novel Healthcare Solution for the Aging Society
- Miss Elana Simon, 18, New York; New
Diagnostics and Therapeutics for a Pediatric Liver Cancer:
Transcriptome and Whole Genome Sequencing Reveals Oncogenes and
Novel Chimeric Protein Kinase in Ten out of Ten Patients
- Miss Emily Wang, 18, Palo Alto, Calif.;
Illuminating Disease Pathways: Developing Bright Fluorescent
Proteins to Improve FRET Biosensing
$10,000 Scholarships
- Miss Sofia Bramante, 17, Fairfield, Conn.;
Fabrication of a Flexible, Tunable Color Changing Skin Using
Magnetically Responsive Fe304 Photonic Crystal Structures
- Miss Isabel DeBre, 17, Los Angeles;
The Problem of Representation: Refugee Trauma in Postcolonial
African Fiction
- Miss Smriti Kanangat, 17, Hinsdale, Ill.;
Detection of Soluble Human Histocompatibility Antigens (HLA) in
Circulation-Potential Biomarkers for Early Detection of Non-Small
Cell Lung Carcinoma (NSCLC)
- Miss Tuong-Phi Le, 18, Houston;
Shadow and Song: Revitalizing the Expatriate Vietnamese Identity
Through Mythological Media
- Mr. Kevin Lee, 17, Irvine, Calif.;
Strongly Coupled Electromechanical Modeling of the Heart in Moving
Domains Using the Phase-Field Method
- Mr. Michael Parsons, 18, Long Hill, N.J.;
Composition as Architecture
- Mr. Josh Wolf, 18, Elk River, Minn.;
Shocking Lipid Production: Oil Extraction by Novel Electrical
Stimulation of Botryococcus braunii
- Miss Romi Yount, 16, San Francisco; Music
without Borders: Transcending Cultural and Temporal Boundaries
Through Guzheng Performance
About the Davidson Institute
Founded by Bob and Jan Davidson in 1999, the Davidson Institute for
Talent Development recognizes, nurtures and supports profoundly
intelligent young people, and provides opportunities for them to develop
their talents to make a positive difference. The Institute offers
support through a number of programs and services, including the
Davidson Fellows and The
Davidson Academy of Nevada. For more information about the 2014
Davidson Fellows, please visit
www.DavidsonGifted.org/Fellows.
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High-resolution photos and more information are available at
The Davidson Gifted Website.
Click
here to visit the
Davidson Fellows Press
Room.
Coordinate interview opportunities with the Davidson Fellows and their
nominators by emailing
DavidsonFellowsMedia@DavidsonGifted.org.
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