NSF Awards Graduate Research Fellowship

Sharon Truesdell has been awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship. The program is the NSF's most highly regarded initiative and is designed to recruit high-potential, early-career scientists and engineers and support their graduate research training in STEM fields.

Sharon Truesdell, the recipient of an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. Courtesy of the University of Akron.

Truesdell, a Ph.D. student in the University of Akron's Department of Biomedical Engineering, works in the Bone Biomechanics and Mechanobiology Laboratory under the guidance of Marnie Saunders, associate professor in biomedical engineering and associate dean of the Graduate School.

Truesdell's graduate work focuses on the development of a microfluidic lab-on-a-chip device capable of mechanically stimulating, characterizing, and quantifying the activity of bone cells. Her findings may present new insight into such bone diseases as osteoporosis.

As part of the award, Truesdell will receive three years of support, with NSF providing a stipend of $34,000 and a cost-of-education allowance of $12,000 to the graduate degree-granting institution each year.