By Irene Hsiao
Congratulations to third-year undergraduate chemistry majors Keir Adams and Maritha Wang, who have been awarded 2019 Goldwater Scholarships! The Goldwater Scholarship is given to exceptional undergraduates who demonstrate a passion for research and potential for leadership in the fields of natural sciences, mathematics, and engineering.
Keir Adams is a third-year double majoring in chemistry and molecular engineering. Adams entered the University intending to research renewable energy and materials science, inspired by his travels to Europe and his observations of international responses to climate change (“When you fly into Copenhagen, you see vast wind farms stretching into the sea,” he says. “That’s a stark difference from [what I saw] growing up in a Midwestern city”). Upon learning that Professor Emeritus Takeshi Oka was looking for an undergraduate to conduct quantitative research in astrochemistry, Adams leaped at the opportunity to develop his computational skills in a field completely new to him. In Oka’s lab, he has simulated the absorption and emission spectra of interstellar molecules and has quantitatively modeled temperature and density distributions in nebulae. During his second year, he also worked with Professor Emeritus of Astronomy and Astrophysics Donald York to statistically analyze astronomical spectral bands. “There are really great mentorship aspects to our relationships,” Adams says, noting that he has always worked one-on-one with Oka and York.
Adams has also spent a summer synthesizing bismuth-based compounds for supercapacitor applications in the laboratory of Neil Robertson at the University of Edinburgh. This summer he will combine his interests in computation and renewable energy by using machine learning and computational simulation techniques to screen electrolyte materials for battery technologies with Rajeev Assary at Argonne National Lab. On campus, he is an avid participant in the undergraduate chemistry society, Benzene, and he tutors math and chemistry to high school students in Hyde Park. He intends to apply to doctoral programs in computational material science and physical chemistry next year.
Maritha Wang is a third-year double majoring in chemistry and physics. An early affinity for building drew Wang to engineering at an early age. During a high school internship studying 2D materials-based composites for medical devices for type 1 diabetes at the Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Center, Wang became interested in combining materials research with engineering. Now, as an undergraduate researcher in Jiwoong Park’s lab, Wang studies how to engineer nanoscale textures in atomically thin materials for foldable electronics applications. Summer research developing a surface tension-based actuation mechanism for transforming flat 2D materials into microstructures for possible use in micro- and nanoscale machinery and robotics in Paul McEuen’s group at Cornell further confirmed her desire to research materials for medical technology and electronics.
At UChicago, Wang is Managing Editor at Scientia, a biannual print publication featuring undergraduate research articles and faculty profiles. “It is crucial that you can make your science accessible, and as such, I've always really appreciated Scientia's vision of communicating science clearly to a diverse campus audience,” she says. Wang will take the helm as co-Editor-in-Chief next year. She has also been an active member of the Neighborhood Schools Program, where she prepares lesson plans and materials for an after-school science club that she helped start at one of the UChicago Charter Schools. “In my academic and research careers, I have been largely shaped by the excellent mentors that I've been fortunate enough to have, and I think it's very important to pass this forward, especially to mentor the young students in our communities,” she says. Wang intends to pursue a PhD in materials science.