Honors & Awards

Grants, fellowships, awards and other honors that recognize and support innovative research and world-class teaching.

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Topic

  • Annual award named for university distinguished professor of law

    “To recognize the trailblazing career of University Distinguished Professor of Law and Humanities Patricia Williams, the Race and Private Law Section of the Association of American Law Schools has named an annual award in her honor. The Patricia J. Williams Award celebrates Williams’ role as a leading critical race theorist, feminist legal theorist and private law trailblazer.”

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  • Noveck named by Apolitical to Government AI 100

    The award recognizes professor Beth Noveck’s innovation, research and reimagining of democratic processes through the lens of new and disruptive AI technologies.

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  • Digital Archive for Indigenous Language Persistence receives grant to create manuscript collection

    Directed by dean’s professor of civic sustainability and professor of English Ellen Cushman, the Digital Archive for Indigenous Language Persistence will collect and annotate a collection of Cherokee manuscripts called “The Willie Jumper Stories.”

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  • NIH funds Ivanov’s proteome profiling

    “Deep proteomic profiling of scarce biological and clinical samples is still a major challenge since no amplification techniques are available for proteins and proteoforms, and current state-of-the-art proteomic techniques based on conventional chromatography columns coupled with mass spectrometry provide suboptimal performance and sensitivity levels. In this study, based on our novel, currently unavailable on the market, chromatographic column technology, we plan to build a reliable, robust, thoroughly evaluated commercialization-ready prototype chromatography platform to enable ultrasensitive proteomic profiling and address the challenges of numerous clinical, academic, and industrial laboratories.”

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  • DoE funds Feiguin’s quantum materials research

    “Our ultimate goal is to accelerate discovery in quantum materials at DOE-supported user facilities. We will meet this goal through three specific aims. Aim 1 — generating and confirming novel low-energy effective many-body models for quantum materials. … Aim 2 — accelerating model solutions for advanced non-perturbative computational methods — is creating new state-of-the-art computational approaches for solving these models. … Finally, aim 3 — creating end-to-end experiment and theory workflows — is laying the foundation for integrating Aims 1 and 2 into new scientific workflows for scattering experiments.”

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  • Shansky receives National Institute of Mental Health support to study brain development post-pregnancy

    “Pregnancy is characterized by marked changes in circulating hormones that can induce long-lasting changes in the brain. The goal of this project is to determine how the hormone allopregnanolone may induce a robust neural inhibition in the medial prefrontal cortex during pregnancy, resulting in over-compensatory actions that persist well after birth. Our work will provide much-needed insight into the development of the brain post-pregnancy.”

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  • Levendis receives engineering communication award

    “Mechanical and industrial engineering distinguished professor Yiannis Levendis is one of 15 collaborators who received the 2024 Jack Bono Award for Engineering Communication in the field of fire technology from the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE) for their paper ‘The Use of Unmanned Aerial Systems in Outdoor Fire Fighting.’ This award recognizes authors who have made contributions to the advancement and application of professional fire protection engineering.”

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  • Monagle inducted as Academy of Nursing Education fellow

    “Twenty-seven distinguished nurse educators have been selected as the 18th class of fellows for induction into the prestigious National League for Nursing Academy of Nursing Education. With the addition of this newest class, the academy membership has now reached 406 members. These fellows join a fellowship of leaders in nursing education who teach in a range of programs across the spectrum of higher education. They are affiliated with top-ranked teaching hospitals, academic institutions, and other organizations committed to advancing the quality of health care in the US and globally.”

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  • Heising-Simons supports conference for women in physics

    “This grant supported the work of professor Orimoto to participate in the the organization of a conference aimed at addressing the unique challenges faced by mid-career women physicists in large collaborations. The name of the workshop was Mid-Act 2024 – A workshop for Mid-Career Women in Physics Collaborations. Professor Orimoto has personal experience as a long-time member of large physics collaborations (BaBar and CMS collaborations) and also from being a mid-career woman physicist. In addition, the PI has had significant conference organization experience in the past.”

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  • Space networks and near fields: Jornet gives IEEE keynote

    “Electrical and computer engineering professor and associate dean of research Josep Jornet gave a keynote speech on ‘Terahertz Communications: From the Near Field to Space Networks’ at the IEEE Consumer Communications & Networking Conference in Las Vegas.”

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  • Patent for ‘Compounds for Treating Cannabinoid Toxicity’

    “The present invention relates to novel compounds that can act as antidotes for treating “Acute Cannabinoid Overdose” produced by classical cannabinoids such as Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and several synthetic psychoactive cannabinoids (SPCs).” Find the paper and full list of authors at the link.

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  • Cram receives NSF award for valve research

    “Many of the organs in our body are built of tubes. … Critical components of these tubular systems are contractile valves and sphincters. … However, tiny valves composed of a just few cells can somehow also perform these functions. In the reproductive system of the nematode C. elegans there is a donut-shaped valve that opens and closes hundreds of times to allow eggs to pass from where they are fertilized to the uterus. The team … will characterize the inner structure of the valve cell with light and electron microscopy and use genetic perturbations to discover the molecular mechanisms that…

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  • Sayre receives ACS grant

    “Photocatalyzed C−N cross coupling creates pharmaceutical and agricultural chemicals using the energy of light. This project aims to improve the efficiency of photocatalyzed C−N cross coupling by enhancing light absorption and exploiting reaction mechanisms.”

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  • Klein receives Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant to expand criminal court data

    “Criminal municipal courts in the US are standalone courts that operate under the purview of municipalities and cities, as opposed to state judiciaries. They are largely thought to be the ‘lowest’ tier of the criminal legal system. … The general public has little sense of the volume of cases being tried in the system, the amount of money collected by municipalities through fines and fees, and even the number of courts in a given state. In this grant, we take a system-wide approach in collecting, digitizing, and visualizing longitudinal data on every criminal municipal court in every state where they…

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  • Di Pierro receives NSF grant for computational genetics

    “Genomes fold into distinct architectures that reflect both the cell’s phase and type, with the spatial organization of genes playing a crucial role in facilitating physical interactions among genetic regulatory elements. These interactions are essential for gene regulation within organisms and tissues. This project aims to develop innovative theoretical and computational tools to model the mechanics of chromatin at the gene level, enabling the study of how various genetic factors influence the three-dimensional structure of genes.”

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  • Barabási receives NIH funds to investigate ‘impact of biomedical tools’

    “The impact of biomedical tools on the scientific community and society at large is largely invisible to traditional metrics. This project will develop a ground truth corpus by extracting laboratory techniques, software applications, and modeling methods from existing ontologies, and identifying their mentions by analyzing the full-text of millions of documents from publications and grants to patents and clinical trials. Then link this information to generate a knowledge base called BioToolKB and develop a multidimensional impact measure of BioTools to allow us to quantify and understand their diffusion and the diffusion mechanisms across biomedical fields.”

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  • Egido receives NSF funding to study electric vehicle infrastructure

    “The project integrates theory and methods from computational social science, urban resilience, behavioral science, and complex systems to address a pressing societal need — the equitable, resilient, and sustainable deployment of Electric Vehicles Charging Stations (EVCSs). The results of this project will enable agencies and businesses to evaluate hypothetical deployment scenarios of EVCSs , promoting a multi-dimensional approach to infrastructure design.”

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  • Monaghan Lab receives NIH funding to research retinoic acid in axolotls

    “This study aims to investigate the mechanisms by which retinoic acid modifies chromatin architecture and gene expression to establish the proximodistal (shoulder to digit) axis in the salamander forelimb during regeneration. Utilizing methods in nucleic acid sequencing, in situ visualization, and genome editing, the investigators explore the molecular underpinnings of retinoic acid’s influence on positional identity in regenerating limb cells. The results of this study will deepen our understanding of the fundamental pathways promoting complex tissue regeneration, potentiating novel therapeutic targets in humans, whose regenerative capacity is largely restricted to the digit tip.”

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  • Brenhouse made president-elect of International Society for Developmental Psychobiology

    Heather Brenhouse, professor of psychology at Northeastern University, “directs the Developmental Neuropsychobiology Lab. She has served on the ISDP Governing Board since 2022, and has been honored to help further the organization’s mission of encouraging and disseminating science related to perinatal development, childhood and adolescence — all critically important for a comprehensive understanding of the brain and behavior. She has also served on the Women’s Task Force as a member of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP), and is a member of the Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology (SBN).”

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  • Egido receives NSF funding to study healthy food choices within urban planning

    “In this project, the investigators study the causal relationship between the urban areas we visit frequently and healthy food choices using massive datasets of human mobility in cities. The results will offer broader impacts on a range of future issues in public health, urban planning, and transportation management.”

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  • Linker made Honorary Fellow of Massachusetts Historical Society

    Assistant professor of history Jessica Linker was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Massachusetts Historical Society, the oldest organization in the United States devoted to collecting materials for the study of American history.

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  • Lucas appointed to Board of Early Education and Care

    Professor of the Practice in public policy and economic justice Kimberly Lucas “has been appointed to the Board of Early Education and Care by Governor Maura Healey. Professor Lucas will serve as an expert in the evaluation and assessment of successful preschool education programs,” the College of Social Sciences and Humanities wrote.

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  • Hua Dong receives teaching innovation award

    Principal lecturer in Chinese and coordinator of the Chinese program Hua Dong has been selected as the recipient of this year’s New England Chinese Language Teachers Association Teaching Innovation Award.

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  • Barabási receives Gothenburg Lise Meitner Award for ‘groundbreaking’ network science research

    “At my core, I remain a physicist — trained, thinking and driven by the desire to advance the field of physics. Receiving the Gothenburg Lise Meitner Award holds special significance, as it is awarded by the physics community of Gothenburg and carries the name of the most remarkable woman physicist in history. I am deeply honored,” Barabási told Chalmers.

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  • Zhang receives Responsible Research in Management award

    Assistant professor of management and organizational development Victoria Zhang has received the Responsible Research in Management Award from the Academy of Management for her paper “Where Is All the Deviance? Liminal Prescribing and the Social Networks Underlying the Prescription Drug Crisis.” “This annual award recognizes and celebrates recent research that benefits society by producing credible and useful knowledge,” the Academy of Management noted in their announcement.

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  • Lu receives distinguished communication scholarship

    Associate professor of communication studies in the College of Arts, Media and Design Amy Lu has received the Gerald M. Phillips Award for Distinguished Applied Communication Scholarship from the National Communication Association. “Dr. Lu’s scholarship explores the power of narratives in interactive communication technologies informed by an interdisciplinary and community-engaged approach,” the association states in its announcement. “This program of research has been supported by an impressive record of securing external grant funding and demonstrates great promise in shaping the future of health communication.”

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  • Patent granted for engineered bacteria ‘secreting therapeutic proteins’

    “Engineered bacteria that secrete therapeutic polypeptides, pharmaceutical compositions comprising the bacteria, methods for producing recombinant polypeptides, and methods for using the bacteria for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes are provided,” the abstract reads.

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  • Taylor receives Harold Osher Award for research in sleep problems for children with autism

    “Taylor, an emerging researcher in the field of mental and behavioral health, was presented with the Harold Osher Award for Excellence in Clinical and Population Health at the annual Lambrew Research Retreat sponsored by the MaineHealth Research Institute on May 1st, 2024. One hundred and thirty abstracts were submitted for the award, and after a blind panel review, Taylor’s abstract, ‘Sleep Problems in Children with Autism at the Time of Psychiatric Hospitalization in Relation to Parental Stress and Self-Efficacy,’ was awarded first place in the category of clinical and population health research.”

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  • Wesley wins 2023 Fox International Case Writing Competition

    In a post on LinkedIn, David Wesley wrote that he was “honored to be the winner of the 2023 Fox International Case Writing Competition with the case study, ‘Anheuser-Busch and the Anti-Transgender Boycott of Bud Light.'” Wesley performed this research “to show how Bud Light, as the leading beer brand in America, had to deal with a crisis situation that resulted from its campaign with a transgender influencer, Dylan Mulvaney.” Wesley continued, “The case highlights the duty of care that businesses have to their stakeholders, especially in times of crisis.”

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  • Zheng receives funding for ‘innovative’ hybrid fuel cells

    “Mechanical and industrial engineering associate professor Yi Zheng received a research grant of $208,957 to work on a three-year project, ‘Innovative Hybrid PEM Hydrogen Fuel Cell,’ from THETA LLC of Fall River, Massachusetts. This project will study the biomimetic hybrid hydrogen fuel cell as a practical alternative, addressing key barriers to widespread adoption. This involves developing non-platinum (Pt)-based gas diffusion layer/carbon electrodes, implementing enzymatic catalysts, and constructing a hybrid fuel cell to achieve high current and power densities by increasing the volumetric loading and conductivity of the hybrid biocatalyst.”

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