UMaine Grad Student Receives EPA Fellowship for Cancer Research
Contact: Aimee Dolloff, (207) 581-3777
A University of Maine student in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences is one of 22 students in the country who were selected to receive a Greater Research Opportunities fellowship from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Jamie Young of Portland received one of only two awards granted in New England for her research regarding potential exposure of the general public to hexavalent chromium and arsenic, two environmental pollutants known to be lung carcinogens.
Her research will focus on developing a model for understanding the toxic interactions between these environmental contaminants that commonly are found in drinking water. Young’s study, which she is conducting at the University of Southern Maine’s Wise Laboratory of Environmental and Genetic Toxicology, is slated to run from Sept. 1, 2008 through Aug. 31, 2011.
The Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences offers students a doctoral degree in biomedical sciences and is a collaboration that consists of: UMaine, USM, The Jackson Laboratory, Maine Medical Center Research Institute, Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory, University of New England College of Osteopathic Medicine, and Eastern Maine Healthcare’s Maine Institute for Human Genetics.
EPA supports several fellowship programs as a way to address the country’s environmental workforce needs.
EPA’s Greater Research Opportunities fellowship program helps build environmental studies programs at universities with limited funding for research and development. A total of 156 applicants competed this year for 22 fellowships, according to a press release from the agency.
Since the fellowship program began in 1995, EPA has awarded more than 2,200 fellowships. All applications for EPA’s fellowship programs are peer reviewed. Graduate fellows receive up to $37,000 a year to complete their degrees. The undergraduate program pays tuition and a stipend for the junior and senior years of study and includes a summer internship at an EPA facility. The undergrad fellowship provides up to $17,000 per year of academic support and up to $7,500 of internship support for summer.
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