2007 Recipients of The Deans' Award for Academic Accomplishment
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Lauren Caldwell, an English and Creative Writing major completing a fourth year coterminal degree, has been honored for her published poetry and critical essays in which she uncovers the influences of philosophical systems on the work of the poets she addresses. Her penetrating original readings demand reconsideration of influential approaches in the field, an achievement marked by the appearance of her work in a major critical journal as an undergraduate, an exceedingly rare achievement in the humanities.
Winner of the Beinecke Scholarship, Lauren’s original readings unseat critical arguments that too quickly set aside authorial intent and dismiss complexity as unnecessary or irrelevant display. Lauren’s insistence on a deep understanding of context enable her to reveal deliberately wrought order within the syntax and structure that sometimes centuries of critics have missed. She has exploded the almost universal reading of Christopher Smart’s Jubilate Agno as an eclectic collection of odd and fairly useless observations. Hailed by Helen Brooks, one of the foremost Donne critics, as “brilliant,” Lauren’s reading of John Donne’s Satyrs answers detractors who dismissed the density of syntax
Working with Professor Christopher Rovee, she developed a new interpretation of Arnold’s Dover Beach that forces reconsideration of some of the most respected claims in the field. The result will be published in Victorian Poetry.
Nominator Christopher Rovee writes: “Lauren is the most impressive students I’ve encountered at Stanford. She will make any program that she enters better and she will certainly develop, very shortly, into a significant figure in the field.”
William Cheng, a senior majoring in Music and English, is honored for his virtuosity as a pianist and his professionally researched, intellectually mature, skillfully written papers on topics in music history, theory and aesthetics, which have recently gained him enthusiastic offers of admission to most of the top graduate U.S. programs in musicology.
A piano student of Professor George Barth, Will is a phenomenally gifted musician. Winner of Stanford’s annual concerto competition last spring, his performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto sparked a standing ovation. Winner of the Blew-Culley-LaFollette Prize in solo performance, Will was an invited participant in the 2006 International Keyboard Master Class. He has performed with the Stanford Symphony Orchestra on its Australia/New Zealand tour and is just now collaborating with the St. Lawrence Quartet on campus as part of the international symposium, “Reactions to the Record: Perspectives on Historic Performance” (19-21 April).
A sophisticated musical scholar, Will has given public presentations of two papers in the last year: “The Aesthetics of Evil in Liszt’s First Mephisto Waltz” at a local chapter meeting of the American Musicology Society (AMS) in May 2006 and an essay in “biographical hermeneutics” offering a new reading of Tchaikosky’s Romeo and Juliet fantasy-overture, presented last December to the Stanford Graduate Musicology Forum. Will has also been appointed as a fellow in the AMS Cultural Diversity program.
Nominator Professor George Barth writes: “Will has the facility of a virtuoso, an ear for style, remarkable powers of memory, and the ability to communicate with clarity and conviction. He really is a marvel, in every way an outstanding musician, thinker and communicator.”
Alejandro De Los Angeles, a Biological Sciences major completing a fourth year co-terminal degree, is honored for his ingenuity in designing stem cell research that will provide new therapies for stroke and other neurological disease.
Working with Professor Gary Steinberg, Alejandro pursues an honors thesis on improving the safety of intravascular delivery of neural stem cells after stroke using the interaction of cell surface proteins and their endothelial receptors. His ability to design and carry out his creative research questions requires the synthesis of ideas from different fields and mastery of new translational stem cell techniques, including surgeries normally performed by postdoctoral fellows. Alejandro now proposes to induce protective autoimmunity to improve the survival of transplanted neural stem cells. He will also pursue regeneration of diseased brain tissue through a study of potential therapeutic effects of growth factors.
Alejandro’s work appears in abstracts of major scientific conferences, including the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, Society for Neuroscience, International Stroke Conference, American Association of Neurological Surgeons, and International Symposium on Cerebral Blood Flow, Metabolism and Function. He is second author on publications submitted to the journals Stroke and Journal of Neuroscience Research. Professor Steinberg writes, “Alejandro has not only demonstrated a remarkable devotion and talent for translational stem cell research, but a rare ability to innovate cures. His passion and commitment to finding a cure for stroke and other neurological conditions will have a lasting effect in our field. He is by far one of the most outstanding and gifted young researchers I have had the pleasure to work with.”
Wesley Holliday, a senior in Philosophy is honored for his Honors Thesis entitled "The Myth of Multiple Realizability". He is also honored for brilliant work throughout his undergraduate years, including original analyses of Descartes that successfully counter the interpretations of established scholars.
Working with Professor John Perry, Wesley’s focuses on a powerful argument against the philosophical view that mental states can be identified with brain states. The argument is that since we can imagine mollusks and martians and maybe even robots having pains and thinking thoughts, we cannot identify doing those things with being in human brain states. Holliday takes on some of the leading philosophers of the last fifty years, from Hilary Putnam to Jerry Fodor to David Chalmers, in diagnosing with great sophistication and subtlety how this argument falls short. It is an important work, which will doubtless be published in an important philosophical forum and have an important effect on ongoing debates in the philosophy of mind.
Professor Perry writes: “Our meetings are the high point of my week. Working with Wesley Holliday is like working with a superb graduate student of the sort one seldom sees but often dreams about.” According to nominator Professor Graciela DePierris: “Wesley Holliday is simply extraordinary: he is the most brilliant, clear, original, insightful and philosophically talented, as well as the hardest working and most enthusiastic, of all the undergraduates and most of the graduate students I have ever taught.”
Tiffany Hung, a senior in Biological Sciences, is honored for her research on the molecular mechanisms that enable chromatin modification signals to regulate cell function, and how disruption of these mechanisms may contribute to cellular transformation. Tiffany’s significant contributions to the fields of chromatin regulation and cancer biology may eventually lead to novel therapies for cancer.
In Professor Or Gozani’s lab, Tiffany helped to discover the precise process by which chromatin is modified in response to DNA damage. The ING proteins are a family of tumor suppressors associated with cancer and cellular aging, and their deployment serves to inhibit the propagation of cells harboring damaged DNA until repair processes have occurred. Tiffany’s research will characterize the biological significance of ING4, a member of the ING family thought to link chromatin regulation with tumor suppression. Tiffany’s results provide evidence for the mechanism by which ING4 triggers cell death which may have consequences for the treatment of cancer.
Already co-author of a paper in Nature, Tiffany will be first author when this most recent work is submitted for publication. She recently presented her project at an international chromatin research conference held in the Dominican Republic. Nominator Professor Gozani writes: “Tiffany has thoroughly impressed me with her intelligence, hard work, genuine commitment to research, and overall enthusiasm. I have taught and interacted with numerous undergraduates from Harvard, MIT, and Stanford. In comparison to this group, Tiffany ranks at the very top.”
Michelle Shepard, a senior majoring in Human Biology, is honored for her original research into suturing techniques that enable early mobilization after injury, thereby reducing the muscle atrophy and tendon elongation that result from long periods of disuse. Her published work on the surgical repairs of Achilles tendon is the first of its kind.
Surgical repairs of Achilles tendon ruptures must provide adequate strength to allow for early active mobilization protocols. Working with Professor Loretta Chou of the Department of Orthopaedic Trauma, Michelle executed the first tests of the efficacy of supplementary epitenon sutures, which have been shown to increase ultimate tensile strength and gapping resistance in flexor tendons of the hand. To carry out her study, Michelle quickly learned the anatomy and completed a thorough literature review. She learned how to dissect the cadaveric specimens and specific suturing techniques, demonstrating command of medical terminology and orthopaedic surgical procedures.
Bound for medical school, Michelle will publish the first phase of her work as first author in the peer reviewed journal Foot Ankle International and expects to publish the second phase in coming months. Nominator Professor Chou writes: “Michelle is an exceptional student. She has shown over and over that she has the intellect, drive and organizational skills to succeed at anything.” Additional nominator Professor Gordon Matheson, Director of Sports Medicine adds: ”She is innovative, creative, confident, and independent. Her work is absolutely first class.”
Michael Susman, a senior in Human Biology with concentrations in neurobiology and psychobiology is honored for his work on the development of synaptic connections in the visual system. He is also honored for his thesis on perfecting techniques to evaluate plasticity in the sensory cortex. His work has far-reaching implications for modeling the regulation of synapse formation and elimination, and for the treatment of neurological disorders.
Working with Professor Ben Barres and Dr. Andrew Huberman, Michael quickly mastered new experimental techniques and literature on the development of synaptic connections in the visual system. His early sophistication explains his roles in planning experimental design, performing surgeries and histology, and imaging and interpreting data. Michael’s work on the role of glial-proteins in the development and plasticity of the mouse somatosensory cortex will enable researchers to directly evaluate the relationship between synapse formation and elimination and axon projection patterns. He has used this novel method to evaluate synaptic plasticity in two different lines of mutant mice.
Michael is co-author of a paper published in the Journal of Neuroscience. Co-nominator Professor Jeffrey Wine writes: “We have many outstanding students at Stanford, but Mike stands out for a level of commitment that is more appropriate to an advanced graduate student.” Professor Barres agrees: “Mike possesses a remarkable ability to formulate and carry out novel experiments to test important questions in neurobiology. He is one of the most outstanding undergraduates I have ever had in my lab and a truly exceptional candidate for a Deans’ Award.”
Steven Tagle, a senior in Psychology pursing honors in Feminist Studies, is honored for his award-winning fiction, plays, and films, and for his role in encouraging the arts at Stanford and in the Palo Alto community.
Steven’s work pushes past boundaries with a daring that creates new insights and inspires those who work with him. His fiction has been published in The Mind’s Eye, Rainy Day, and the Leland Quarterly, and he has performed dozens of readings on radio for live audiences. His first film, Model Man, exploring the boundaries between human and machine, and love and exploitation, was the first student film selected for inclusion in the Stanford Alumni Film Festival in Culver City. Model Man has been widely screened at film festivals including the Los Angeles International Short Film Festival, NewFilmakers NY, and the Boulder Asian Film Festival. At the International Horror and Sci-Fi Film Festival it was honored with the Best Cinematography Award, at the Park City Film Music Festival it won the Bronze Medal for Excellence in Short Film, and it was a semi-finalist at the First Annual Show Off Your Film Festival.
Steven’s honors thesis, his first novel, explores and challenges how super-hero iconography often serves as a kind of objective correlative for the mysteries of young malehood. Nominator Professor Elizabeth Tallent writes: “If the future could construct a young artist the way that Mr. Tagle’s robotics engineer constructed the perfect man, it would fashion a young writer and filmmaker with the very qualities of originality, discipline, insight, and emotional honesty that Steven possesses—but most of all, the future would want his kind of daring. His intense focus and discipline surpass anything I’ve previously seen even among Stanford’s extremely high-achieving undergraduates.”