{"id":12963,"date":"2016-02-23T16:38:22","date_gmt":"2016-02-23T21:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/college.unc.edu\/?p=12963"},"modified":"2024-07-02T16:27:29","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T16:27:29","slug":"sloan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/?p=12963","title":{"rendered":"Three UNC faculty members receive 2016 Sloan Research Fellowships"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Zhen<\/a>
Zhen Gu<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three UNC faculty members have been awarded a 2016 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, a two-year grant given to early-career scientists and scholars whose distinguished performance and unique potential identify them as rising stars, the next generation of scientific leaders.<\/p>\n

Carolina\u2019s recipients this year are Zhen Gu<\/strong>, Jillian Dempsey<\/strong> and Alexander Miller<\/strong>, bringing Carolina\u2019s total Sloan recipients to 44 since 1958 and affirming Carolina\u2019s commitment to attract the brightest and most innovative young scientists and engineers. All three recipients are faculty members in the College of Arts and Sciences.<\/p>\n

\u201cSloan Fellows represent the best-of-the-best among young scientists,\u201d said Jeffrey Johnson, the chair of the chemistry department, home to two of the new Sloan fellows. \u201cIn an increasingly competitive academic environment, it is difficult to stand out, but to us this award comes as no surprise. The work of professors Dempsey and Miller is hitting on key issues of our time, from solar and reusable energy to activation and utilization of abundant chemical feedbacks. They are having a huge impact on how researchers think about these complex issues.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zhen Gu<\/strong>, an assistant professor in the joint biomedical engineering program at Carolina and North Carolina State University, joined NC State and UNC-Chapel Hill in 2012, and has since created dozens of technologies and techniques aimed at precisely delivering the right drug to the right place at the right time to maximize the impact of therapeutic medications. Gu\u2019s work is truly interdisciplinary, drawing on biomolecular engineering, materials chemistry, nanotechnology and other fields to develop more effective drug delivery tools and techniques.<\/p>\n

Gu\u2019s work on diabetes includes the development of a \u201csmart insulin patch<\/a>\u201d that mimics the function of pancreatic cells and multiple injectable nanoscale systems<\/a> that can help to regulate insulin<\/a>. Gu is currently working with pharmaceutical companies to move these inventions into clinical trials. In 2015, Gu was named one of MIT Technology Review\u2019s \u201cInnovators Under 35<\/a>\u201d for his work on developing novel drug-delivery systems for treating cancer and diabetes.<\/p>\n

He has also created a suite of \u201cprogrammed\u201d approaches for targeting the delivery of anti-cancer drugs, the release of which can be promoted inside the tumor microenvironment or cancer cells.<\/p>\n

\"Jillian<\/a>
Jillian Dempsey (photo by Lars Sahl)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jillian Dempsey<\/strong>, an assistant professor of chemistry, searches for ways to efficiently capture sunlight in artificial systems and carry out fuel-producing reactions to store the sun\u2019s energy in the high-energy chemical bonds of molecules like hydrogen. Her work is contributing to a growing need to develop renewable, environmentally friendly energy sources.<\/p>\n

Since starting at Carolina in 2012, she has won the Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering as well as the Air Force Young Investigator Research Program award for showing exceptional ability and promise for conducting basic research while following uncharted paths that can lead to groundbreaking discoveries.<\/p>\n

Dempsey serves as a science advisory board member for the National Science Foundation\u2019s\u00a0Center for Chemical Innovation in Solar Fuels\u00a0and is on the executive committee of\u00a0UNC\u2019s Energy Frontier Research Center in Solar Fuels.<\/a> She is a recipient of NSF\u2019s CAREER Award, one of the foundation\u2019s most prestigious awards given in support of junior faculty.<\/p>\n

\"Alexander<\/a>
Alexander Miller (photo by Lars Sahl)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Alexander Miller<\/strong>, an assistant professor of chemistry, is researching new catalysts for use in the sustainable manufacture of next-generation fuels. In addition to converting natural gas and biomass to more convenient liquid fuels, his group is developing catalysts that use solar energy to convert water and carbon dioxide and liquid fuels and oxygen.<\/p>\n

Since starting at Carolina 2012, Miller was named to\u00a0Forbes\u2019 \u201c30 under 30\u201d\u00a0list in the energy category. The annual list chooses the brightest stars in 15 categories, ranging from energy to Hollywood to social entrepreneurs. In 2014, Miller was awarded that University Council James Moeser Award for Distinguished Research at Carolina.<\/p>\n

The Sloan fellowships are awarded in eight scientific fields: chemistry, computer science, economics, mathematics, evolutionary and computational molecular biology, neuroscience, ocean sciences, and physics. Fellows receive $55,000 to be used to further their research. Sloan Research Fellows have gone on to win 43 Nobel Prizes, 16 Fields Medals, 65 National Medals of Science, 14 John Bates Clark Medals, and numerous other distinguished awards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The honor is given to early-career scientists who are encouraged to think big and look at complex issues with a fresh perspective.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":12985,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[1705,24,1595,1706,36,37,38,39,40,1707],"class_list":["post-12963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-natural-sciences-mathematics","tag-alexander-miller","tag-carolina","tag-jillian-dempsey","tag-sloan-fellowships","tag-unc","tag-unc-arts-and-sciences","tag-unc-college-of-arts-and-sciences","tag-unc-chapel-hill","tag-university-of-north-carolina-at-chapel-hill","tag-zhen-gu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47614,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12963\/revisions\/47614"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}