Graduate student Elaine Qian (Spokoyny lab) is one of nine women selected to receive the ACS Women Chemists Committee’s 2nd Annual Merck Research Award.
The American Chemistry Society (ACS) Women Chemists Committee (WCC)’s Merck Research award, sponsored by Merck & Co., recognizes exceptional third- and fourth-year female graduate students. As part of the award, Qian will be presenting her research at next week’s ACS meeting in Washington, D.C. She will be speaking on Sunday, August 20th at the WCC/Merck Research Award Symposium held from 8:25-12 p.m. in the Marriot Marquis Catholic University room. Qian’s talk titled “Atomically precise, tunable organomimetic cluster nanomolecules (OCNs)” will take place at 9:10 a.m.
Qian received her B.E. in Biomedical Engineering with honors from Vanderbilt University in 2014. At Vanderbilt, she conducted research in the Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering lab of Dr. Jamey D. Young, where she worked on inhibiting apoptosis and elucidating the metabolic pathways in mammalian cells. After she came to UCLA in 2014, she joined the chemistry lab of Professor Alexander M. Spokoyny, where she is researching organomimetic cluster nanomolecules (OCNs). Qian is an NIH Chemistry-Biology Interface Program (CBI) Training Fellow. In 2016, she led the interdisciplinary team whose research was featured in Nature Chemistry. Earlier this year, she received an ACS WCC/Eli Lilly Travel Award.
In 2016, UCLA Chemistry and Biochemistry graduate student Emma Baker (Garg group) received the inaugural ACS WCC/Merck Research Award.
Visit the Spokoyny lab website to learn more the group’s research.
