2 CBE PhD students inducted into Bouchet Graduate Honor Society

Jade Noble and Christian Aponte-Rivera, PhD students in CBE, have been inducted into the Edward A. Bouchet Graduate Honor Society.

Jade Noble does her research in the Kourkoutis Lab.  She uses cryo-electron microscopy to probe the macromolecular aspects of disease. Current projects include elucidating the mechanisms of microvesicle biogenesis in metastatic breast cancer cells and understanding post-insemination structural changes to spermatozoa in the Zika transmitting mosquito Aedes aegypti. 

Christian Aponte-Rivera, advisee of Roseanna Zia, focuses on transport phenomena and microscale flows. His interests are in the area of micro-particle transport in colloidal suspensions, and in particular on hydrodynamically interacting colloids which are fully enclosed within a microscopic domain. This work is of interest from both a fundamental standpoint, in understanding how fully 3D micro-confinement affects transport properties, and also with a view toward applied science; this model can be used to understand the mechanical motion of particles inside the crowded, watery interior of eukaryotic cells. Knowledge of such behavior will be used not only to answer fundamental questions about the impact of mechanical transport on overall cell behavior, but may also be used in the rational design of cellular-level disease treatments. To approach the problem we developed a spherically confined Stokesian Dynamics simulation method that accounts for many-body hydrodynamic (and other) interactions.

The Bouchet Society recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and promotes diversity and excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate. It seeks to develop a network of preeminent scholars who exemplify academic and personal excellence, foster environments of support and serve as examples of CLASS: Character, Leadership, Advocacy, Scholarship, and Service.  For more information about the Bouchet Society, visit http://gradschool.cornell.edu/inclusion/bouchet.