Trinity College Fulbright Awardees Announced

Jun 24, 2011

The announcement of the 2011-2012 Fulbright Scholarships saw nine individuals from Trinity College Dublin receive awards.  Fulbright scholarships provide Irish and US students, scholars and professionals with the opportunity to study, lecture and research at top universities and institutions in the US and Ireland respectively.  The awards are jointly funded by the Irish and US governments under the Ireland-United States Commission for Educational Exchange.

The successful recipients have been accepted at leading institutions including Harvard, Berkeley, Cornell and Rice.  In the prestigious Fulbright International Science and Technology Award category both of the two scholarships awarded went to TCD researchers, Elizabeth O’Sullivan and Ellen Roche, who will receive fully funded PhDs in the US worth $300,000 each.

The Fulbright Awards are presented on an annual basis to Irish students, scholars and professionals to undertake postgraduate study and research at higher education, cultural and related institutions in the United States.  Applications are encouraged in all disciplines including the visual and performing arts.

The next Fulbright Awards Competition 2012-2013 will open to applicants on Monday 5th September 2011.  More information is available online at www.fulbright.ie.

TCD Fulbright Awardees include:

Oisín Lyons is the Fulbright – Glen Dimplex Awardee in Renewables.  Oisín is a PhD Scholar in Mechanical Engineering at and will undertake research in the area of heat transfer and fluid dynamics at Purdue University.

Catarina Marvoa is a PhD student at TCD’s Department of Economics at the School of Social Sciences and Philosophy and the recipient of a Fulbright – Schuman Award that promotes research and teaching in EU – US studies.  She will be based in the Department of Economics of Johns Hopkins University for 6 months where she will undertake research in the area of Regulation of Cartels in the EU and US.

Eoin McGuirk is a PhD student at TCD’s Department of Economics at the School of Social Sciences and Philosophy and will undertake research in development economics at University of California, Berkeley.

Dr Fiona Newell is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the School of Psychology and the Institute of Neuroscience at TCD.  Dr Newell will undertake research at Florida Atlantic University in the area of Perceptual processes across the lifespan: the development of efficient cross-modal object and face perception during infancy.

Mairead Ni Choine is the Fulbright – CRH Awardee in Business Studies.  She is undertaking a PhD in Structural Engineering and will be researching at Rice University in Texas.  Her research area is ‘Risk based optimization of seismic retrofit strategies for deteriorating infrastructure’.

Ellen Roche of TCD’s School of Engineering is a recipient of the Fulbright International Science and Technology PhD Award.  Ellen will undertake her PhD in Biomedical Engineering at Harvard Medical School in August 2011.

Elizabeth O’Sullivan of TCD’s School of Medicine is a recipient of the Fulbright International Science and Technology PhD Award.  Elizabeth will undertake her PhD specialising in Nutrition at Cornell University.

Dr Ruchika Sharma is the recipient of a Fulbright Scholar Award.  Dr Sharma is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at TCD. She will conduct research at the Department of Physiology and cellular Biophysics, Columbia University where she will investigate the structure and function of a bile acid transporter, results of which will aid in discovery of novel treatments for hypercholesterolemia.

Myles Dungan is currently a PhD candidate at TCD’s Department of History at the School of Histories and Humanities.  An award-winning author and broadcaster with RTÉ, Myles was also a Fulbright Scholar in 2007.  He will be returning to the History Department at the University of California, Berkeley as a Fulbright Distinguished Visiting Senior Scholar to present a one-semester inter-disciplinary course entitled Aspects Of Ireland Since the Union.

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